The book, with it's padded cover and delightful illustration on the cover, was immediately inviting. It encouraged you to open it and discover the treasures that lay within. Once opened it did not disappoint. There were well known Sunday school stories within, told in language that could be easily understood by children. The stories are pared with wonderful songs sung by the St Johns Children’s Choir.

This will be a delightful gift for an expectant parent. Although the target audience is a child, it is for a child who may not yet be able to read. The parent will have to read it to them. Why not start reading this book while the child is in utero and get familiar with the songs so that when the child is born the parent can interact with the infant more naturally around the stories and sounds. This gift promotes interaction with a parent or grandparent through the act of reading and singing, which we know is very beneficial to children. It also lays a foundation of faith for the child that can be later built upon by the family.

The only criticism is that a song sheet with the words of the songs would have been a nice addition. However don't let this stop you, with repeated listening you will soon be humming the tunes and singing the songs under your breathe. ( )

This is my first book review for Thomas Nelson Books. I chose to review the kids book – 100 Bible stories 100 Bible songs. It is created by Stephen Elkins and illustrated by Tim O'Connor. The book is hard-cover but has a soft cover feel like a lot of kids books have. The book includes 2 cds that contain 100 songs and each song goes with a story in the book. The book is brightly colored and will catch the attention of any child. Each story (or Bible summary) is short and is good for short attention spans. Under the title of each story, is the title of the song that goes along with it so that you could listen to the song along with reading the story. It also gives the scripture reference that the story is from so that you can easily find it and read the whole story from the Bible. The book and songs are separated into Old and New Testament making it easy to pick which one you want to read/listen with your child.

The stories in the book are very simplistic and good for toddler age. I do, however, think they are too simplistic and tend to not complete a story/illustration fully. An example of this is in the story of Saul. The story goes on to say that "Jesus is the Son of God. People who believe this are called Christians." It says in James 2:19 – "You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that and shudder." (NIV) Obviously, demons aren't Christians, so I think the simplistic nature of the book doesn't fully allow complete definitions/thoughts/ideas to be taught to a child. I think this is where the story's scripture references (and parental knowledge of the Bible) will come in handy in "Training up a child in the way that he should go."

If you want your child to learn about the 10 commandments, don't look to this book. It tells briefly how the commandments came about but it doesn't list the commandments at all. Again, the scripture reference comes in handy.

I didn't run across glaring inaccuracies in the book EXCEPT Moses. In the story about the promised land, it says that Moses went up to Mount Nebo and was happy as the Israelites entered the promised land. However, this is NOT biblically accurate. The scripture reference for this story is Deuteronomy 34 and in this chapter, it says Moses went up to Mount Nebo and died and God buried him there. In verse 8 it says, "The Israelites grieved for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days until the time of weeping and mourning was over." (NIV) If you continue reading into Joshua 1 verses 1 and 2 it says, "After the death of Moses the servant of the Lord, the Lord said to Joshua son on Nun, Moses' aide: Moses my servant is dead. Now then, you and all these people, get ready to cross the Jordan River into the land I am about to give to them" (NIV)

I have just 1 more thing to point out. Don't expect that this book will mesh exactly with how you interpret scripture. Different denominations of churches interpret things in different ways. An example of this is baptism. Two statements made in the book are: "Baptism shows the world that we love Jesus" and "When I am baptized, God will be pleased". I won't get into a theological discussion on this except to say, I don't agree with those statements but no book will be able to cater to all beliefs.

Overall, this is a good introduction to the Bible for kids but don't let it be the only source for teaching your child about God. Make use of the scripture references listed and read the whole passage to your child. ( )