[SPEAKER_03]: Christian parenting.
[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to the Bible for Kids Podcast with your hosts, author Trisha Goyer, and author and co-creator of Veggie Tales, Mike Nuraki.
[SPEAKER_00]: If instilling biblical values and kids is important to you, this podcast will give you the resources, wisdom, and hope to do just that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now let's join our hosts, Trisha, and Mike for this week's episode.
[SPEAKER_01]: Welcome back to the Bible for Kids Podcast.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm Trisha Goyer.
[SPEAKER_03]: And I'm Mike Naraki.
[SPEAKER_03]: We're here today with Rob Kuri, author of the Children's Book, Time for Courage.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like all the ways we start every Bible for Kids Podcast with a Bible verse, some Mike.
[SPEAKER_03]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_03]: Today's verse is taken from Joshua one nine.
[SPEAKER_03]: This is my command.
[SPEAKER_03]: Be strong and courageous.
[SPEAKER_03]: Do not be afraid or discouraged.
[SPEAKER_03]: For the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.
[SPEAKER_01]: And this is a wonderful verse for today.
[SPEAKER_01]: Rob Curie is an award-winning author with a lifelong fascination with World War II.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like me, he's also the son of a World War II veteran and teaches psychology at Justin University and Elgin Illinois, Rob Luz and Northern Illinois with his wife for they raise two sons.
[SPEAKER_03]: Welcome, Rob.
[SPEAKER_03]: Great to have you on today.
[SPEAKER_02]: Good to be talking with you.
[SPEAKER_03]: All right.
[SPEAKER_03]: Well, we were just kind of talk a little bit before we got on the air about, you know, our commonality to Illinois there.
[SPEAKER_03]: You're in Elgin.
[SPEAKER_03]: Is that right?
[SPEAKER_03]: Well, you're at Jutson in Elgin.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, and live nearby.
[SPEAKER_03]: I was in downers Grove most recently, you know, but well, meaning 22 years ago, I'm sure the weather is pretty much the same in March.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_03]: this so many years ago.
[SPEAKER_03]: Well, tell us a little bit more about kind of your life at Jetson and just sort of your family and a little background on yourself.
[SPEAKER_02]: Alright, so I'm a product of Christian education.
[SPEAKER_02]: I know that God has many paths for people and they're all awesome.
[SPEAKER_02]: Christian education from sits right on through college.
[SPEAKER_02]: and I had teachers that poured into me.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was like the shyest kid you have ever met.
[SPEAKER_02]: And now I stand up and make a living standing up in front of people talking and loving that.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like,
[SPEAKER_02]: How that happened?
[SPEAKER_02]: How did that happen?
[SPEAKER_02]: I have parents and teachers and other adults at church support into you.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's blossom.
[SPEAKER_03]: That's great.
[SPEAKER_03]: That's wonderful.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I feel the same way.
[SPEAKER_03]: I always love public speaking, but now I'm a professor.
[SPEAKER_03]: I have to stand up in front of the students and talk all the time.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's like, how did I get here?
[SPEAKER_03]: Sometimes I think it's as I'm standing there.
[SPEAKER_01]: because we get excited about the things that we like and we're like, hey, I want to learn about these things too.
[SPEAKER_03]: Right, right, right.
[SPEAKER_03]: And after a while, you stop carrying what people think about you as you're standing at.
[SPEAKER_03]: I have to be like, you can think what you want.
[SPEAKER_03]: Here I am.
[SPEAKER_03]: Passion has the way of dispelling fear.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, absolutely.
[SPEAKER_03]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_01]: I love that while I'm so excited about this book, a time for courage, it's a secret, a sequel to your book, Hunger Winter.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's about, I would love to hear more about that first book.
[SPEAKER_01]: I love World War II ever written over 25 World War II novels and interviewed hundreds of World War II veterans.
[SPEAKER_01]: I cannot wait to read these books.
[SPEAKER_01]: I am so excited about them.
[SPEAKER_01]: But tell us first about the first book and then what inspired you to continue
[SPEAKER_02]: The first book is a God story.
[SPEAKER_02]: Life is a God story, but sometimes he pulls back the curtain so we can't miss it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: My younger son who was not a great student in study hall, said a goofing off or whatever or his own, you know, he wrote a short story for fun.
[SPEAKER_02]: He came home and told me about it, showed it to me, it was about World War II and the Netherlands.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hmm.
[SPEAKER_02]: I said, hey, why don't we write a book together?
[SPEAKER_02]: Not to publish.
[SPEAKER_02]: or run off two copies one for you one for me.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'll write a chapter you read a chapter.
[SPEAKER_02]: Sure, dad, that sounds great.
[SPEAKER_02]: I did the first chapter.
[SPEAKER_02]: He lost interest, but but there's some of my dad's, what were two veterans?
[SPEAKER_02]: You said my wife is Dutch, American, born Dutch.
[SPEAKER_02]: And at any point in my son would have said, now I don't want to do that, it would have never happened.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know what?
[SPEAKER_02]: God's got it.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you want something to happen, it's going to happen.
[SPEAKER_02]: It doesn't matter what the odds are.
[SPEAKER_02]: Now the first book is about a little known true story from World War II where every occupied country suffered.
[SPEAKER_02]: But the Dutch suffering was unique.
[SPEAKER_02]: They were starved by the Nazis retaliation for what the Dutch resistance did.
[SPEAKER_02]: To this day that Dutch referred to that last winter of the war,
[SPEAKER_02]: 44.45 as the hunger winter.
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's why it shows the name of the book.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so it's about the set up for the story is there's a pounding on the front door in the middle of the night.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a neighbor.
[SPEAKER_02]: The Gestapo just embossed your older sister that had come for you next as a way to get to your father.
[SPEAKER_02]: You've got to run now.
[SPEAKER_02]: So this 13-year-old boy leaves home in the middle of the night in the dead of winter.
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, but if the Gestapo can't find Papa, what chances a 13-year-old boy
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_03]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_03]: So, so, you know, so that's, that's, that's Dirk, right?
[SPEAKER_03]: Is the 13 year old boy?
[SPEAKER_03]: Yes, sir.
[SPEAKER_03]: That's right.
[SPEAKER_03]: And so, um, so, and they're in a farm near Utrecht.
[SPEAKER_03]: Is that how you pronounce that, that, that's a town?
[SPEAKER_02]: Close enough, I say, Utrecht, but I'm sure the Dutch folks would criticize me in the first book, they're in a different town, but in time for courage, yes, they're correct.
[SPEAKER_03]: Utrecht, okay, great, and then tell us, you know, it's always fascinating when you go in, especially, you know, obviously your history, you know, historical book, but tell us just about your research process for going into this and kind of what you learn through that whole time.
[SPEAKER_02]: Sure, so you might get tired of me saying God things, but I just want to give him the glory.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: So this book could not have been written 20 years ago, maybe even 10 years ago, because there are people who suffered and did things that didn't want to talk about it.
[SPEAKER_02]: It've all heard stories and Trisha may be in your interviewing.
[SPEAKER_02]: Some of the people were willing to talk to you, but as you probably know, some are not.
[SPEAKER_02]: But later in life, as these
[SPEAKER_02]: Also, some of the best resources are in Dutch only.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't speak or read Dutch.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it didn't think it was a good use of my time to learn and learn.
[SPEAKER_02]: But now there's computer products.
[SPEAKER_02]: You can easily translate.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so I was reading thousands of pages of material that's largely unknown to the English speaking world.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_02]: And like, wow, I get to do this.
[SPEAKER_02]: But 10 years ago, I couldn't have done it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_02]: So many things got puts in place.
[SPEAKER_02]: He's got it.
[SPEAKER_03]: Wow, wow.
[SPEAKER_03]: So just like a translation program that you would just run these manuscripts through and what kind of manuscripts were they, I mean, just tell us a little bit about kind of where you found them and kind of how you track them down.
[SPEAKER_02]: Some of these are most of the materials were books.
[SPEAKER_02]: Some of them are pretty rare.
[SPEAKER_02]: And actually, I hope I'm not boring the audience with us.
[SPEAKER_02]: You can scan it as a PDF, convert it to Word document and click Translate.
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, a little more complicated, but not much.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, right, right, right.
[SPEAKER_03]: So, yeah, but no, it's just interesting, so a lot of the stuff you found online, did you have to go to the Netherlands at all to track any of this down?
[SPEAKER_02]: We went there twice, yeah, wanted to see things, we interviewed people.
[SPEAKER_02]: God just opened up people and opportunities the last time before we went.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was trying to track down some obscure information and I'm a university professor and I have access to a good university library and I was striking out.
[SPEAKER_02]: I said to my wife, we could come home empty handed.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then a guy reached out to me and he says, you need to come see me.
[SPEAKER_02]: I've heard about you.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't get the wrong idea.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not well known, but I was sending emails to various people and somebody for it to him.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_02]: So he gave us a stack of books.
[SPEAKER_02]: One of the books, they were 900 printed.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_02]: So old gone and gave us one wow stack of books.
[SPEAKER_02]: Just got open doors and I said to my wife why don't I trust God more Line so much of my own efforts.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, that's that's incredible
[SPEAKER_01]: I always pray, I say, God, you are there in 1942 or 44 or 45, I've like, believe me, it's the right person.
[SPEAKER_01]: I've had wonderful stories too, but I love that you're writing about the just reasons.
[SPEAKER_01]: I've touched on it just a little bit one of my books and developed, but they were outgunned, they were outmanned, you know, basically they surrendered.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's going to run away.
[SPEAKER_01]: They could not stand up to look happening.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I love that through this novel through this 13-year-old boy that students today are getting to hear about it So why do you think it's important for kids today to learn about World War II?
[SPEAKER_01]: Learn about the Holocaust?
[SPEAKER_01]: Learn about all these things through fiction And so I live with love also a little bit more about how your
[SPEAKER_01]: role in education and then also psychology like you can see things also it's a novel but there's so much that kids need today to know about that time era.
[SPEAKER_02]: So young people are living in a challenging world they have challenges that I didn't have when I was growing up and I believe firmly that heroes shine the brightest in the darkest times.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's a few instances in
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's good for kids to see that, see examples.
[SPEAKER_02]: Most of the stories I tell in my novels, those historical fiction are things that people actually did.
[SPEAKER_02]: And what some might not realize is that you probably do Trisha, many of the people who made a difference were young people.
[SPEAKER_02]: In the case of the Dutch, the fathers were being grabbed and sent to slave labor camps.
[SPEAKER_02]: or in hiding, young women particularly were affected because the Nazis didn't suspect them they thought, well, you know, she's young lady, she's innocent, she's not going to be up to any mischief here and the laser get away at the young women with all sorts of things and do amazing things, boys too, for the resistance.
[SPEAKER_02]: So when you read a novel, you want to see yourself and one of the characters and I want the young people of today to see like, wow.
[SPEAKER_02]: That kid's the same age as me or almost, and he, he did that, and maybe I could nerve up and do the right thing and fight a friend of church, try to change a habit, have a difficult conversation with somebody.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, that's so cool.
[SPEAKER_03]: Well, it is time for our first break, so we're going to take a short break, and we'll be right back on the Bible for kids.
[SPEAKER_03]: Parenting is busy.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This easter experience the Resurrection story through a fresh and powerful perspective.
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[SPEAKER_03]: from the co-creator vegetals in the voice of Larry the cucumber comes in all new Dead Sea squirrels adventure.
[SPEAKER_03]: By the way, that's me.
[SPEAKER_01]: When Michael and Justin are forced to hide Merle and Pearl's identities in a class presentation, they turn to AI to generate odd squirrels' stand-ins, uncle, merge, and and purge.
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[SPEAKER_03]: Don't miss Cybersquirrels, book 13 in the Dead Sea Squirrel series, available April 7th wherever books are sold.
[SPEAKER_01]: Welcome back to the Battle for Kids.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're here with Rob Curry and we're here talking about his book, Time for Courage.
[SPEAKER_03]: Rob, before the break, you were just talking about the examples that these characters can set for kids from today, and I wanted to just dive into that a little bit more.
[SPEAKER_03]: Dirk's family intervenes by providing ration cards and finding families to hide children.
[SPEAKER_03]: How do you hope young readers will respond to that kind of bravery and risks taken by
[SPEAKER_02]: No, that's fine.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I hope that they will be inspired to do that next brave thing.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'll tell you a story about a young woman that I knew she died in a car accident age 16.
[SPEAKER_02]: She was like super quiet and people just kept coming forward and say, you know, what Becky made such a difference in my life when her parents are like, oh,
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, she was sweet and wonderful, but really, this is not the class president, the outgoing talkative person.
[SPEAKER_02]: What happened in a girl came up to her parents and said, your daughter's a reason I'm alive.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was bullied, I was belittled.
[SPEAKER_02]: She was a one person that befriended me.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_02]: And you know, who among us?
[SPEAKER_02]: Young or older in between doesn't know somebody that's a little overlooked.
[SPEAKER_02]: Sit with that lunch at school to talk to at the workplace, the neighborhood to invite the church.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: We just don't know where our actions could lead how might contribute to the kingdom.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_03]: And it's just that sort of quiet courage in caring for others that can make such a big difference.
[SPEAKER_03]: Mm-hmm.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think about that.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's so many stories that are untold.
[SPEAKER_01]: I love that you're able to tell inspired by true stories, but there's so many people in the Dutch underground that stood up against injustice and will never know their stories.
[SPEAKER_01]: I love that you can shed light on some of them.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I know that you are a public speaker.
[SPEAKER_01]: I've been a guest on Radio and TV.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, talking to kids in schools, how do you get them excited about this?
[SPEAKER_01]: Because I love just a minute ago when you talked about the first book started, your tone change, your talking about what happened at the beginning of the book.
[SPEAKER_01]: That kind of set, fiction, and those type of, in just the way we were able to present it, even your pools, students, and so let's talk about that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because I think a lot of students, you know, are just talking to one of the kids that I teach in homeschool co-op, and she's saying, you know what?
[SPEAKER_01]: I thought I didn't like history, but I've been sharing some of my World War II stories, but it really matters how you hear about it.
[SPEAKER_01]: My other teachers were really boring, so how did I did about history?
[SPEAKER_02]: So part of my DNA, I guess you could say, is I love the moment when I can say or write something that makes a light go on in somebody's mind.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not the only person like that.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're all like that in some way.
[SPEAKER_02]: So in the classroom, on a teaching, which is not what we're mostly talking about, I know.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I can say something like, oh, okay, now I can see how that matters.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not just something that could be on a test or in the case of writing.
[SPEAKER_02]: My older son was what we call a reluctant reader.
[SPEAKER_02]: He didn't like to read, but he liked to be read too.
[SPEAKER_02]: So God was using that to train me how to write historical fiction before I knew that.
[SPEAKER_02]: But also, I have a heart for reluctant readers.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, it's not only the books aren't only for those people, but it does have a tendency to grab kids that think they don't like history.
[SPEAKER_02]: And like, oh, oh, there was a girl in a middle school who wouldn't do her schoolwork unless the teacher was standing over her.
[SPEAKER_02]: Not a bad kid, just school is hired.
[SPEAKER_02]: Teacher is reading the first book, Hungry Winter, to the class.
[SPEAKER_02]: Girl goes up after classes.
[SPEAKER_02]: And says, can I take that book home with me on a read it on my own?
[SPEAKER_02]: So God is blessed, and that I just a fire in me.
[SPEAKER_02]: It wants people to get it, to be excited about reading, be excited about history, and be excited about God and connecting those things.
[SPEAKER_03]: Well, that's wonderful.
[SPEAKER_03]: And just hearing that passion is great.
[SPEAKER_03]: You know, I was I was that same kid in in school growing up history was boring.
[SPEAKER_03]: It was just a collection of dates and names, but I took in college is an elective.
[SPEAKER_03]: I took a history class that just lit a fire for me.
[SPEAKER_03]: And I just loved it.
[SPEAKER_03]: I ended up then double majoring in history just because I became
[SPEAKER_03]: So interested in this is just more, it's more than names and dates, these are real people, real characters, real movements.
[SPEAKER_03]: And once you invest in that and start to, you know, you feel that, you know, it's just, it's really exciting.
[SPEAKER_03]: And so I just love seeing kids get attached to that, that's so cool.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_03]: We mentioned that time for courage is a sequel to your book Hunger Winter.
[SPEAKER_03]: Do you foresee these characters, Dirk or sisters going on any other adventures in the future?
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's the same family in book one in book two and I'm actively working on book three right now Yeah, no predictions when that'll come out probably be a while yet, but yes, I'm very excited about that and very I have another story that's largely unknown in the English speaking world that'll be sharing in that book Wonderful and now what time period does the current book end or are we still kind of in the middle of the war when it ends?
[SPEAKER_02]: uh... yes we're so begins in january nineteen forty five uh... in march nineteen forty five in the eight uh... excuse me the war ended in may a forty five okay okay so i have a feeling what might happen in the third book no spoilers
[SPEAKER_01]: He's not going to give anything away right now.
[SPEAKER_03]: That's right.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, well, I would love to hear more.
[SPEAKER_01]: Even about your father's World War II experience and did have any influence on your writing of a time for courage or tongue or winter?
[SPEAKER_02]: So my dad's experience, per se, did not he sort of state side.
[SPEAKER_02]: He repaired planes.
[SPEAKER_02]: So the pilots were learning to fly.
[SPEAKER_02]: The oil's got to be changed, and it's tuned up and so on.
[SPEAKER_02]: But he was always reading a World War II books.
[SPEAKER_02]: They all take a look at this.
[SPEAKER_02]: This one's really good.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think when an age that doesn't like to say that we have heroes, because when a leader falls, it's very public, but I absolutely have heroes.
[SPEAKER_02]: I know they're imperfect.
[SPEAKER_02]: Cory Tinn boom from the Netherlands is one of my heroes, Winston Churchill's a hero.
[SPEAKER_02]: He had a lot of flaws, but he was a great man.
[SPEAKER_02]: My dad had an influence.
[SPEAKER_02]: He was an avid reader, one semester of college.
[SPEAKER_02]: but he read avidly so he influenced me to read and then he was always recommending word word to a book so I got hooked on the category in that period of history.
[SPEAKER_03]: Did you ever like like get stuck in front of the history channel with your dad or was that did that come along afterward?
[SPEAKER_02]: That was that was after you.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, it would be more yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: Before I was old enough to read I watched my dad reading the newspaper I thought boy he's enjoying that.
[SPEAKER_02]: I want to read when I get a little older.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it just encourage parents listening, your baby is contagious.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you want your kids to love reading, read to them, let them see you reading, turn off the TV and let them see you with a book.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, yeah, I love that.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, we read our kids all the time, and they have a continued love of reading with that.
[SPEAKER_03]: And it's fun, too.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's a such a fun way to spend time with your kids.
[SPEAKER_03]: I remember reading, my biggest challenge was reading the Lord of the Rings trilogy to my son when he got a little bit older, and it was a challenge to read it, but it's spending that time together.
[SPEAKER_03]: And no, it's just such a wonderful thing to be able to do.
[SPEAKER_03]: Talk to us about just the process of his writing historical fictions of fiction.
[SPEAKER_03]: What's the biggest challenge?
[SPEAKER_03]: I know you probably obviously have to deal with reality in the midst of all this fictional characters within the reality.
[SPEAKER_03]: Tell us a little bit about your challenges.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I'll talk about two challenges.
[SPEAKER_02]: The hardest thing is to find a really good story that has an already been found by somebody else.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah, you can do an American history.
[SPEAKER_02]: I know I know just washing crossing the Delaware Desp and done Probably done.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yes, but what about George Washington's dog?
[SPEAKER_03]: What was he doing?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so it's hard to find a unique Actually, I have a little nugget on George Washington
[SPEAKER_02]: a messenger came to the British general.
[SPEAKER_02]: While Washington was sneaking into position, handed him a note to that effect, the general's playing cards, stuffed it in his pocket, thought I'll read it later, never looked at the note, and that general died the next day in battle.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_02]: But okay, that was a little tangent.
[SPEAKER_02]: No.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't find a little nugget that hasn't already been covered.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then once I have that, if I get the resources, I use the following comparison.
[SPEAKER_02]: Suppose that you want to make a beautiful stone wall around your property.
[SPEAKER_02]: really, really, really nice.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so you go out and find the best-looking stones you cannot, I'm not talking pebbles.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, like, like, semi-boulder size.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: You got the equipment to move it, and there's interesting shapes and textures.
[SPEAKER_02]: You pile them all up in your yard and say, okay, now how can I fit these together into a wall?
[SPEAKER_02]: So what I do is I go out and find, I start with what are the best stories within this theme?
[SPEAKER_02]: in this time period in this country.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then I'm going to fit it, fit them together.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like you go to the farmers market, not knowing what you're going to fix for dinner, and they got first this and first it all, that's awesome.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then you come home and you kill it for supper.
[SPEAKER_03]: I love, I love that that description of it because there's a, I don't know, there's an openness and a curiosity there.
[SPEAKER_03]: You don't know exactly how it's going to turn out, but
[SPEAKER_03]: you're just fitting those pieces together in a way that's cohesive and entertaining and hopefully teaches good lessons.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was talking to, I think, was Andrew Peterson.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not like I run with him all I wish I did.
[SPEAKER_02]: Some people said, do you think that when person writes a novel that sometimes the characters kind of run away with a story or the kind of story, he said the good novels do.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, you start to, you know, just enjoy listening to your characters talk to each other after a while.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a knock at the door and you're wondering who's there.
[SPEAKER_02]: I heard a story of mom, who was an author, is in the resale store with her daughter.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's a stuffed animal, stuffed dog, and she's got a character in her novel named Mandy.
[SPEAKER_02]: She picks it up, puts it in a car, says Mandy would love this.
[SPEAKER_02]: And the daughter looks horrified, mom, mom.
[SPEAKER_02]: You do know that Mandy's not real, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: That's also, yeah, Rob, I would also love to hear about the face elements in your book.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you have a favorite or how do you handle that side of it?
[SPEAKER_02]: I do.
[SPEAKER_02]: So in both books, the family, uh, Dirk's family are, I believe, is but Dirk is not.
[SPEAKER_02]: He's respectful, but he's really struggling with how kind of believe in God, when so many hard things have happened before, the first book starts his mother's past away.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not ruining any surprises.
[SPEAKER_02]: Now it's tough on all of them, of course.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so in each of the books, he gets an answer.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I want to do as hook people with a story and then once they're
[SPEAKER_02]: get an answer and the answer is usually a half a page, it's brief, it's to the point.
[SPEAKER_02]: And you know, who of us at some point is not going to struggle with that, to some degree.
[SPEAKER_02]: It might not be a crisis, but it could be like, bye.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's that's that's that's pretty tough.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so I wanted there to be enough story that somebody that is not a Christ follower would pick up the story and they had some Jesus seeds planted in them.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, but enough enough Jesus so that they can be something to spiritually nourish.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's more than just people pray once in a while.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's a there's a definite faith theme to both books.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, it's an integral part of the characters.
[SPEAKER_03]: That's wonderful.
[SPEAKER_03]: Well, finally Rob, I just you know, you mentioned you're working on a third book.
[SPEAKER_03]: Is there any other thing that you'd love to share with our listeners just about what you're up to with you in your ministry?
[SPEAKER_03]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_02]: So a little bit about the second book, Time for Courage, just came out in January.
[SPEAKER_02]: Just yesterday, we got a review from School Library Journal.
[SPEAKER_02]: Your listeners may know that's one of
[SPEAKER_02]: reviews and it said about time for courage readers will be hooked by the action field storyline.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's endorsed the books endorsed by eight award winning authors, including some pretty well-known people, and three award-war two museum.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, guys been really good in the response to the book is getting.
[SPEAKER_02]: I go to home school conventions, if any of you listeners,
[SPEAKER_02]: are going to those.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't sure when this will air, I'll be to a couple of those Cincinnati and near St. Louis and also Minnesota.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'd love to from the step by and I'd love to shake your hands.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wonderful.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, those conferences are great.
[SPEAKER_01]: Awesome.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, Rob, thank you so much for joining us today.
[SPEAKER_01]: Before we go, can you share with listeners where they can connect with you online and learn more about time for courage?
[SPEAKER_02]: Sure, so my website is www.ropcurryauthor.
[SPEAKER_02]: The last curious ones see you, R-R-I-E. R-Coreauthor.com.
[SPEAKER_03]: All right, and books are available wherever books are sold, I wouldn't imagine.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, places I had never heard of our selling at, yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, exactly.
[SPEAKER_02]: That was a good job, yeah.
[SPEAKER_03]: wonderful.
[SPEAKER_03]: Thank you Rob.
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