We have some friends serving with Child Evangelism Fellowship (CEF) who recently cleaned out their ministry library of kids’ books, and my kids were the recipients of many. A handful of books from this series by Deborah Morris fell in, and, although I was my own kids’ age when these books were first published, I’d never heard of them until now.

Deborah Morris scoured newspapers and radio stations for true stories of kids escaping dangerous situations. With their permission (and I assume following in-person interviews), Morris then recounts these events in story form, placing the kids’ “courage, determination, and faith” on full display.

I wasn’t certain how my kids (ages 10 and 12) would handle these real-life scenarios. After all, my son wasn’t a big fan of Gary Paulsen’s Hatchet or The River simply because they were too true-to-life. The mental images of death and comas scared him, and I don’t really blame him. The kids and others involved in these real-adventure stories all survive, though, so perhaps that’s why both my kids were so enthralled with it.

This first volume contains three stories, and the following synopsis of each:

Firestorm! – In this introductory story from 1988, teens Kathleen and Keith Hedges along with their dad and dog get stuck in a raging forest fire while out on a hike. Having to endure the blaze while submerged in a shallow creek, they survive but still need to make it back to civilization through the smoldering wreckage. It’s a pretty intense tale and was a great way to start us off.

Plane Crash on Christmas Day – In this second story from 1992, thirteen-year-old Shawna Trantham takes a plane ride with her aunt, uncle, and cousin to see the lights on Christmas. When the plane loses power mid-flight, her uncle can’t help but take it for a crash-landing inside a canyon. Despite her injuries, Shawna eventually climbs out of the canyon in search of help, an effort that results in everyone’s rescue and survival.

Lost in Hidden Treasure Mine – In this final story from 1989, ten-year-old Josh Dennis gets turned around without a light in an abandoned mine. After five whole days, rescuers are ready to give up, until former miner John Skinner thinks to look where no one else ever had. This one is a truly miraculous rescue, and it gave us goosebumps at times. After reading it, I now sort of want to do two things: 1) look up the story of that soccer team that got lost in the mines in Thailand in 2018, and 2) never ever let my kids enter a mine.

These stories were all frighteningly enjoyable, and I found them much more exciting than the I Survived series by Lauren Tarshish, simply because these are quite literally “real kids, real adventures,” not just fictitious accounts set in historical settings. My kids have asked that we read the second installment too, so we’ll look forward to doing just that.

©2023 E.T.