Top 5 for Friday : Easter books

It is a sad but real fact that during Christmas you cannot escape the multitude of books with a festive theme, from picture books to children's fiction, cooking and craft to romance. The same cannot be said for the Easter festival. Maybe it is because of the violence, betrayal and death that surrounds the Christian story. While it is exceedingly easy to celebrate the birth a baby, with all the hope for the future that encompasses the event, the same cannot be said for the crucifixion, despite the miracle of the resurrection that is inherent in the story.

Any Easter books we do have are in hot demand so I thought I would blog Easter a week ahead to give you a chance to get to the Library or go online to see if you can reserve something for the weekend. Some will be in use at my special Easter storytime for pre-schoolers on Monday (Warkworth 10.30am) so will only be available after that.

1. The Smallest Bilby and the Easter Games (Nette Hilton & Bruce Whatley). This was an absolute find and is my new favourite Easter book. What happens if the Easter bunnies (yes there is more than one of them) go on strike? Who will deliver the Easter eggs? Will it be Easter if there are no eggs? The other animals in the bush compete to see who will get to deliver the eggs. It's simple, it's fun and it has a great message.


2. Peter Rabbit does Easter in a variety of books in Auckland Libraries. These vary from picture books to board books and lift the flap varieties. Clifford, Spot and even the Berestein Bears also have Easter books.


3. Petook : an Easter story (Caryll Houselander & Tomie dePaola). This book really is about the Easter story but from the point of view of Petook the rooster who meets a young boy on the day his first eggs hatch and years later witnesses his death on the cross. Three days later his latest eggs hatch and he welcomes a new family. This is a lovely retelling which is both nice story and a good introduction to the Bible story.


4. The Easter Angels (Bob Hartman & Tim Jonke). This is a sophisticated picture book and I haven't seen it, but from the cover and the description, this is a book I have ordered. The publisher's description reads In a moving story of two angels, one the angel of death, we see how the angel of death is transformed into the angel of life with the resurrection of Jesus. This story illuminates the heart of the Easter message.


5. Easter Things to make and do is one of our non-fiction books of activities you can do for Easter. From crafts to cooking, there is something in here and our other easter activity books.

The easiest way to find Easter resources at the Library is to go to our catalogue and do a Subject Search for Easter. You can then narrow your search down by clicking on one of the options from children's to adult, fiction to non-fiction, etc.

Why (you may ask) are there no adult books on the list. That's because I couldn't find any fiction that was specifically Easter in nature for adults in our catalogue (although there are several non-fiction resources). There is a raft of Christian fiction and stories of Jesus Christ (starting with Ben-Hur and all the way through to today) so if you do a subject search for Jesus Christ- fiction you will find something but it is not specifically catalogued as Easter fiction. So it is there - you just have to go looking for it.

OR you could ask you friendly librarian for help. Have a good weekend out there.