Surprising and moving. It made me think outside the box and look at life in the first century through the eyes of a child, Jesus. It is easy to think of the Holy Family as three people, striking out on their own. But when you see how important extended family is in those days, it throws that notion out of the window. There were lots of neat references here and there that were later used in His ministry. For example, living water in the pool of Nazereth. Jesus is presented as a thoughtful and brilliant boy who carefully watches what is going on around him.

Rice's notes at the end are a must read. Here she speaks of her break and subsequent return to the Catholic Church. She married a committed atheist and though she followed along, still missed Christianity. She spoke of it coming out in her writing which was more then evident to me. Her vampire books held a profound sadness as seen through the eyes of Lestat; that of living eternally but never seeing the light.

I'm glad Rice's spiritual journey led her back to the Church. Many people can relate to her distress with the contradictions between an all-holy and loving God and judgmental, narrow-minded humans. Thankfully many of her quite valid issues with the Church were dealt with and changes slowly implemented after Vatican II. The journey of the Holy Family went somewhat in a circle, starting at Nazareth, then on to Bethlehem, Egypt , and finally back to Nazareth. Art imitates life, I guess. Or maybe it is life imitates life. ( )

This is not your typical, fluffy Christmas book, but it is gripping, sad, a bit violent, and brooding. But also real and convincing. Anne Rice, the former horror writer, now turned Christian author, gives praise to the Lord through this theoretical depiction of the childhood of Jesus Christ before age 12. The Apocrypha is a questionable source background material, but Rice takes a few of the legends and works them into a believable character. The story opens with the young Messiah striking down a bully and killing him, only to repent and bring him back to life at the site of the grieving family. The story gets darker from there. Joseph and Mary decide it's time to leave Egypt and return to the Holy Land, which is where the prophecies say their Son is supposed to live. When they arrive in Jerusalem, military unrest drives them out, and they seek a home where the family can live peacefully.

During the journey, Jesus continually asks questions about his past because He does not know who He is but has an inkling that His existence has caused suffering. His process is more than a boy becoming a man; it is a boy who would rather be an ordinary man only to learn of His role as God.

When one reads the Luke chapter 2 story, one can see the inconvenience and difficulty of being the Virgin Mary, the stepfather Joseph, or even one of the wise men. The necessity to travel to Bethlehem to complete the census could not have come at a worse time, i.e. when Mary is ready to give birth. Herod's jealous wrath triggers a pogrom that results in the death of children under age 2 in Bethlehem. But the narrative also brings the reader to a sense of victory and rejoicing. In spite of the hassles, we can, like the shepherds, get excited about the coming of the Messiah.

In Rice's book, the reader enters that same difficult process of grieving the losses but cheering the young Lord. As Jesus struggles to learn his story, you feel His pain and loneliness, as well as His decision to honor the Heavenly Father no matter what truth He uncovers.

In spite of the use of the Apocryphal stories, this one's still a worthy book. You get a sense that being God is not glamorous, nor is it even desirable. But we are thankful that the King of Kings made the sacrifice and became Emmanuel, God With Us. ( )

Like any attempt to chronicle the life of a major world figure in fiction, this novel has its presuppositions and therefore its debatable points, or some might say its flaws. Anne Rice depends heavily upon apocryphal literature for the core of her plot, and says so plainly in her endnote. While this may give some pause from a theological standpoint, this is a powerful and thought-provoking take on the childhood of Christianity's founder. ( )

As a long-time fan of Anne Rice, I pretty much buy anything with her name on it. This book starts a new chapter in Rice's life to devote her writing to Christ. "Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt" is a fiction novel about Christ's life as a child. I believe Rice did a great job in meshing the stories from the Bible and other religious works with her own words and creativity. Christ jumps off the page as a little boy, who not only must cope with growing up, but growing up as the one son of God. I think the most important message of this book is that Christ was a human. He was human and divine, but most people concentrate on the divine part. Rice does an excellent job is showing Christ's human side. I will read this one again and I urge all Christians and Rice fans to read this. You will not be disappointed. ( )

I approached this book with eager anticipation. I had read [Interview with the Vampire] by the same author, many years ago and enjoyed it. So this was a surprising book by this author. She explains how she had returned to her Catholic faith in the accompanying note and was desirous of writing a life of the Jewish childhood of Jesus. A brilliant idea, I thought. I came to the book with an open mind and was, of course, prepared to accept some poetic licence in an imaginative work of fiction. As she indicates in her note the amount of research was impressive, in fact she spent ten years researching for this book and visited the locations as well. So, I was very excited and settled down for a great read. However, this book was a huge disappointment.

How, I asked myself, could an idea that was so exciting turn out to be so dull and boring? And why, having spent ten years researching this book, could she get some basic facts so wrong?

I believe the answer lies in her Catholic approach to the story. She makes free use of apocryphal material and bases her portrait of Mary on the Catholic doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, rather than on the Gospels, which ironically Rice talks about, in her note, with such approbation.

To illustrate, Rice uses apocryphal material that has Jesus bringing clay birds to life and she has him kill a bully and resurrect him, which lays the moral foundation for Jesus’ character at the beginning of the story of Jesus as a kind of magician. It just didn’t ring true for me. This is a different Jesus to the one I know.

Now with respect to Mary as a perpetual virgin, Rice has Mary tell Jesus, who is seven years old at this time, “I have never been with a man, not then, not now, nor will I ever. I am consecrated to the Lord.” This, apart from being psychologically unsound, is factually inaccurate. Compare this with what Matthew 13:55 says about Jesus, “Is this not the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother called Mary? And his brother’s James, Joses, Simon and Judas, and his sister’s are they not all with us?” The answer, of course, is yes. Here are Jesus’ four brothers and at least two sisters, all born by Mary and fathered by Joseph.

So what does Rice do to account for this? She gives Jesus one brother. But she makes him seven years older than Jesus and gives Joseph a previous wife! We wouldn’t want Mary to actually have sex now would we! And Joseph is a model of sexual restraint, even greater than we previously thought; he is a lifelong celibate in Rice’s portrait of him!

Another section that puzzled me is why did Rice have Jesus talk to the Rabbi’s in the temple when he was eight year’s old when Luke 2:42 says he was twelve years old? Because the action of the book only covers one year, that’s why!

I could probably have overlooked all this nonsense if the book had actually been interesting and well-written. But I didn’t like Rice’s style. Her use of five word sentences throughout the book was blatantly obvious and her constant use of Little Judas and Little Symeon and Little Salome, all with a capital L, was an irritant. But apart from that I just found it boring.

My Recommendation :

Cons:

Boring, inaccurate and not very interesting.

Pros:
She captures some of the Jewishness she set out to capture but at the expense of biographical accuracy. ( )