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Katie Fitzgerald reviews Seek and Find: The Twelve Apostles, the fourth Sarah and Simon book by Geert de Sutter.  


Seek and Find: The Twelve Apostles

By Geert de Sutter

Publisher: Ignatius Press

 

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A beautifully designed book  

If there’s one type of book that will entertain all of my kids, ages four up to eleven, it is an “I Spy” book. They will sit together for hours, scouring the pages for all the items on their list, the older ones reading while the little ones hunt with their eyes. All five kids were thrilled to discover that there is a Catholic series of these books when Seek and Find: The Twelve Apostles by Geert de Sutter arrived in our mailbox recently from Magnificat Ignatius.  

This fourth title in the Sarah and Simon series is a beautifully designed collection of twelve scenes depicting moments involving Jesus’ closest friends and followers. On each page, young readers are given a brief description of an event involving one of the twelve apostles, and then they are invited to find that apostle in the spread. Also hidden in every scene are several fictional characters: a young girl named Sarah, a young boy named Simon, an elderly teacher named Felix and his daughter, Estella, Gil the goat, and cats named Lavan and Hoom.  

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Engaging kids of all ages with the faith  

This is an attractive book, just the right size to be held in a lap without being overwhelming. It does take a little bit of effort to find every character in every scene, so it’s not going to be too easy for most preschool and elementary kids, but it’s also not so challenging that kids will want to give up before they find everyone. Though the informational aspect of the book requires reading skills, each page provides a visual list of the people to search for so that the hide-and-seek game can be played independently by a non-reader as well.

The amount of text on each spread is minimal, but these small paragraphs really help kids understand who is who among the Twelve. The book also progresses through the events of Jesus’s ministry, Passion, death, and Resurrection in chronological order, reinforcing the rhythm of the liturgical year.  

This is such a bright, charming book, and it has brought our family so much joy and entertainment already. There is no better way to engage a child with the faith in a positive way than to make it fun and relevant to their interests. This book is a perfect example of how to do that well, and I highly recommend it. Also don’t miss the previous titles in the series —  The Life of Jesus, The Lives of Saints, and On the Way to Santiago de Compostela — which use this same format to illuminate other aspects of our faith.   

 

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Ask for Seek and Find: The Twelve Apostles at your local Catholic bookseller, or order online from Amazon.com or the publisher, Ignatius Press.

 

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Copyright 2024 Katie Fitzgerald
Images: interior page courtesy of Ignatius Press, all rights reserved; all others Canva