Hello all. Scott here, posting under Jaime’s name. I’m taking a brief detour from cute family photos, videos, and stories to put in a plug for a great book, or rather series of books.

Some of you may know of Andrew Peterson, who has been one of my favorite singer/songwriters since I first saw him open for Bebo who opened for Caedmon’s at a tiny church in Dade City Florida way back in 1997. He’s ridiculously good. Seriously, go buy all of his albums, especially ‘Behold the Lamb of God’, which is quite possibly the best Christmas-type album ever (without having a single standard Christmas song on it). Anyways, a few of years ago at his concerts he began talking about a book series that he was writing called ‘The Wingfeather Saga’. They seemed to me to be something like he would have come up with while making up bedtime stories for his kids. The first book was called ‘On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness’ – quite silly, I know (and so does he). I assumed it would be a whimsical kids fantasy story and though I always planned to read it eventually, I wasn’t particularly excited about it. It wasn’t until a few months ago when I saw that the second book in the series (‘North! Or Be Eaten’) was due out soon that I decided to go ahead and give them a shot.

I was honestly surprised at how great these books were. They definitely have the feel of a finely crafted bedtime story and are as funny as I thought they would be (he has a very interesting sense of humor), but I was amazed that the story itself was rich with plot, remarkable characters, great action, strong emotions, and just the right amount of mystery. Both books truly found a perfect balance where they are perfectly suited for a grown man to read and enjoy, and yet I cannot wait to read them out loud to Will, Kirstine, and Benjamin. I talked Jaime into reading them, and she thoroughly enjoyed them as well. Andrew has said that there are five books planned for the series (‘if everything goes according to plan, and it never does’), so we are looking forward to keeping up with them as they come out.

So this is my plug for all of you to run out and get these books. Read them for yourself and read them to your kids. If you take my advice and don’t like them, I’d be happy to buy you a cup of coffee and tell you why you’re wrong.

Here’s the cover of the second book (by which you can judge it) and a brief author bio:

Andrew Peterson is the author of On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, Book One in the Wingfeather Saga, and The Ballad of Matthew’s Begats. He’s also the critically-acclaimed singer-songwriter and recording artist of ten albums, including Resurrection Letters II. He and his wife, Jamie, live with their two sons and one daughter in a little house they call The Warren near Nashville, Tennessee. Visit his websites: www.andrew-peterson.com and www.rabbitroom.com