The End of the Fiery Sword (Emmaus Road Publishing)

It's been a bit slow going for children's books in the Catholic publishing world. Therefore, when I see a new one released, I immediately jump on it to see how good it actually is. One of the latest books I've discovered is called The End of the Fiery Sword, available from Emmaus Road Publishing. What initially drew me to this book was that it presented Biblical typology to a young audience. For those unfamiliar with Biblical typology, it is a kind of symbolism where something in the Old Testament prefigures something in the New Testament. The two most well-known examples of this are Jesus being the new Adam and the Virgin Mary being the new Eve, and these are exactly the subjects of focus for this book.

In this book, Maura Roan McKeegan walks us through the Creation passages in Genesis and contrasts them with the life of Jesus and Mary. For example, Eve was created and made to be the mother of all the earth. Mary was created and chosen to be the Mother of God, and thus our Mother as well. A serpent visited Eve and tempted her to disobey God. An angel visited Mary and asked her to obey God. Through Adam's sin the gates of Paradise were closed. Through Jesus dying on the Cross, the gates of Paradise were opened again. There are several more examples in the book, but you get the idea.

Overall, I was impressed with the content in this book. It took a very difficult subject matter, and made it simple for kids and adults alike. The drawing style was not exactly my cup of tea. I think it was something about the faces, but I won't hold that against the book. Perhaps, the most exciting thing to me is the potential. I read on the website that this was part of "Old and New Series." I hope this means that there are more books coming, because there is so much more typology that can be discussed like the Burning Bush prefiguring Mary, Moses or Joseph prefiguring Jesus, and all the Baptism typology such as Noah's Ark and the crossing of the Red Sea.

This book was provided to me for free by Emmaus Road Publishing. If you found this review helpful, please click here and hit Yes!