Ryan and Essie

By Sarah Scheele

Description:

The story of how Ryan and Essie went into a great new world--and what they did there . . . All his life, 11-year-old Ryan has dreamed of becoming an astronomer--but not, it turns out, of actually going into space. When a public event brings a complete stranger named Essie to the observatory his father directs, she bounces into Ryan's alcove. Ryan's life will never be the same again. And neither will the lives of a whole lot of other people.

Book Takeaway:

The theme of difference between people being reconciled through God's love. Conflict we experience comes from inability to understand the value other people bring to this world. We are self-centered. Sometimes this results in great pain or injury to those around us until God makes us able to understand why He has made other people with their own unique gifts and limitations.

Why the author wrote this book:

Ryan and Essie begins in the world of children, naturally, because I began it as a child. At that age the characters were quite immediate to me and I could not see anything larger beyond their identities and their views about each other. But as an adult, with my own spiritual life much more developed, I began to see how their story could be enlarged from a character study into a spiritual journey for the characters.