Catholic Review of: The Man Who Never Died

The Man How Never Died tells the story of St. Peter in a story format for young children.

 

The story-line hits on the main points and shares some of the thoughts and feeling that St. Peter may have experienced. There is very little dialogue, which could have spiced things up a bit - in that sense, it sometimes feels more like a historic narrative than a fictional historical narrative.

 

It can be a bit choppy at times - the author trying to stay simple without leaving too much out. My biggest qualm with the book is that at one point, a guard is quoted as saying, "In the year 67", which would not, COULD not, have been accurate, since our calendar as we know it would not have been in place yet. They simply would have said "the 13th year of the reign of Nero - with no reference to the year of Our Lord. The priest who wrote this story earlier in the last century, should have known something like that.

 

It sticks devoutly to the Catholic faith, with anecdotes of Our Lady and references to the founding of the Catholic Church, emphasizing that St. Peter is the first Pope. The final chapter explains how it all works with Papal succession.

 

The pencil drawings highlight moments in the story; they sometimes seem a bit cartoony (which normally is a turn-off in our household) but were not terribly distracting. I would encourage interested children to draw their own illustrations for their own personally chosen key moments. Or just let it be and enjoy the story for what it is - a simplistic story that even very young children could follow.

 

I will definitely keep this book in our library, and it will be a good resource for learning about St. Peter, but I certainly would not call it the "be all, end all" children's stories about St. Peter. It tells the most complete picture, without quite being as great as it could be. It opens up discussion and prompts us to go back to the Bible to find out "where was that?" and "Really, he was called 3 times? How did that happen and how did we not know that?"

 

The story line and the story matter beg to be saved for older elementary children (5th-6th grade), but the reading level is relatively low - 3rd grade perhaps. Younger children may like to hear it read aloud, based on their emotional maturity regarding subject matters of death, suffering and such. These things are certainly not glorified in any way and most young children may not even pay that much attention to those sections.

 

You can purchase The Man Who Never Died at Aquinas and More Catholic Books.