Anne Rice is one of my favorite authors. Her Vampire Chronicles books are some of the best books I've ever read. For most of her writing years she has been identified with the horror genre of literature because of these books. In the past few years she had a conversion experience and started following Jesus. In light of this, she decided to write a series a fictional novels about Jesus called Christ the Lord, quite a departure from the Vampire Chronicles.
In the first book, Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, we find Jesus and his family in Egypt and follow them as they leave Egypt to return to Nazareth. Rice imagines how the events of Jesus' late childhood and early adolescence might have unfolded. The second book, which I just finished yesterday, is called Christ the Lord: The Road to Cana. It picks up way after the first on left off. It skips to the adulthood of the the carpenter Jesus of Nazareth and the story goes on from there. It takes us from the days just before Jesus started his public ministry up to the beginning of his ministry.
The thing I love about these books is the way Rice portrays the humanity of Jesus. These are fictional accounts based on her research and study, but are also products of her imagination. So they and may not be accurate at all, and that's okay because they're works of fiction. But what she's doing is helping us imagine what Jesus' life on earth might have been like while he was working, laughing, dancing, crying, hungry, thirsty, etc. She does a good job of portraying the tension of his human and divine aspects without taking anything away from either either of these aspects of his being. So here are two more books to put on your summer reading list.
And finally just for good measure here is an absolutely hysterical Snickers ad featuring Mr. T. Apparently, its been banned:
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