The Last Days of Jesus: His Life and Times

Gr 4–9—The title of this illustrated, ineptly condensed version of O'Reilly's bestselling adult book Killing Jesus (Holt, 2013) is misleading; the book is actually a pseudo-biography of Jesus Christ from birth to death, with as much material on his youth and ministry as on his final week. O'Reilly's audience is uncertain. He confusingly begins with Jesus's presentation at the temple and the visit of the Magi, omitting the basics of the Christmas narrative, and ends with the empty tomb—no Easter resurrection here (even though it's identified in the afterword as "the core of the Christian church"). O'Reilly also states that Jesus's miracles were "stories" or "puzzling events" and that Jesus only claimed to be God's son but was actually Joseph's child, which may offend Christians. The volume's other flaws make it unacceptable as history. For instance, the "Note to Readers" asserts this is a "fact-based book about Jesus the man," but the book combines information with supposition and a lot of storytelling. The latter is based on the New Testament gospels (although no scriptural citations are provided), attributing emotions and motives to the main players. Even the genuine data is not documented, so it's uncertain where O'Reilly's details come from. His writing can't save the book—he annoyingly switches between present and past tense, sometimes in the same sentence. At least the numerous illustrations have some merit. For an alternative, try Lois Rock's The Lion Encyclopedia of Jesus (Lion, 2011), for younger readers, which does an excellent job of tying Jesus's life to modern Christian practices.—Ann W. Moore, Schenectady County Public Library, NY