Will Vaus

Last night I gave a talk on the spiritual themes in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader to the C. S. Lewis Society of Frederick, Maryland. The meeting took place in the Parish Hall of All Saints Episcopal Church. Before the meeting I was treated to a delicious meal at Brewer's Alley where I imbibed the closest thing to British beer which I have ever tasted outside of England. I highly recommend the India Pale Ale from the cask at Brewer's Alley. My host for the evening was Corey Kinna, founder of the society. Corey was sporting a very interesting T-shirt appropriate to the event.... I heartily recommend this friendly group to anyone within the vicinity of Frederick, Maryland. Their blog may be found here: http://frederickcslewissociety.blogspot.com/ .

Currently I am reading The Voyage of the Dawn Treader to my son Joshua's fifth grade class at Highland Elementary School in Monterey, Virginia. I am also sharing with them Pauline Baynes' color illustrations. We are reading a chapter a day, which takes about twenty to thirty minutes. Several children have thanked me for reading the story to them. Their favorite chapters so far have been about Eustace being turned into a dragon and then un-dragoned. Personally, I think this is a great way to prepare for the Dawn Treader movie coming out in December. This is a sort of payback for my fourth grade teacher reading The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe to my class--an event that started me on a life-long journey of reading C. S. Lewis' works. Who knows what results my reading may have on the fifth graders in my son's class?

We are in the process of rescheduling T he Hidden Story of Narnia tour dates for Indiana and Illinois. As it looks now I will be speaking to the Central Indiana C. S. Lewis Society in Indianapolis on Monday, November 1. The signing and talk for the Wade Center at Wheaton College, Wheaton, Illinois (pictured above) has been rescheduled for November 5 and 6. On Friday November 5 I will be addressing an adult gathering at the Wade and on Saturday morning I will be speaking to younger readers about The Voyage of the Dawn Treader . Check back here for more details as those dates get closer.

Sadly, my mother-in-law, Barbara Buckman, died today after a long illness. As I said on Facebook, she will be missed by many who loved her, including me. But our loss is heaven's gain. I would appreciate the prayers of all the readers of this blog for my wife Becky, her father Len, and the rest of the Buckman family. Unfortunately, this also means that the book-signings I had planned for this week at the Wade Center, Wheaton College, Wheaton, Illinois and with the Central Indiana C. S. Lewis Society in Indianapolis will be postponed to a later date. Check back here for updates on The Hidden Story of Narnia Book Tour. Thanks to all for your prayers and understanding.

Here is the upcoming schedule for my Hidden Story of Narnia Book Tour: 9/14/2010 3:30 pm Marion E. Wade Center Wheaton College Wheaton, Illinois Click here for more info: www.wheaton.edu/news/events/events_10_11/09.14.10_Vaus_WadeCenter.html 9/17/2010 7 pm Central Indiana C. S. Lewis Society Indianapolis For more info email: dchintz@sbcglobal.net 9/27/2010 7 pm Frederick C. S. Lewis Society Frederick, Maryland For more info email: fredericklewissociety@yahoo.com Blog: http://frederickcslewissociety.blogspot.com/ 10/7/2010 Austin, Texas Concordia University For more info email: Joel.Heck@concordia.edu San Marcos, Texas Texas State University For more info email: sb03@txstate.edu 10/17/2010 First Presbyterian Church Mesa, Arizona For more information on the Arizona portion of my tour you may contact: bruce@scottsdalechurch.com 10/20/2010 Southern California C. S. Lewis Society Meeting at Azusa Pacific University For more information email: jprothero@cox.net 11/13/20...

Mark Sommer has given a good review of The Hidden Story of Narnia at http://live.hollywoodjesus.com/?p=6103 . Check it out!

My web site has a whole new look. You can check it out here: www.willvaus.com .

I can't wait!

I am traveling to Los Angeles on Tuesday for a television interview on a new program being produced for the Discovery Channel. The title of the program is James Ellroy's Los Angeles. As you may know, Ellroy is the bestselling author of L. A. Confidential as well as a number of other crime novels. Mr. Ellroy will be interviewing me about my book, My Father Was a Gangster: the Jim Vaus Story, and my father's involvement in organized crime in the late 1940s.

This Saturday, May 29, 3 pm, I will be at the Inklings Bookshop & White Hart Cafe in Lynchburg, Virginia signing copies of my new book, The Hidden Story of Narnia . I will also be offering a powerpoint presentation on the spiritual themes in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader . Here is the link to the Inklings Bookshop & White Hart Cafe web site for directions: www.inklingswhitehart.com . I hope to see all of my Lynchburg friends there, and make some new ones....

The Hidden Story of Narnia is now available for purchase on Amazon! Just click here to go there: http://www.amazon.com/Hidden-Story-Narnia-Book-Book/dp/1936294028/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1272660805&sr=8-1 . Of course, if you would like a signed copy, then you can purchase directly from my web site by clicking here: http://www.willvaus.com/inc/sdetail/1768 .

I was at New Covenant Schools in Lynchburg, Virginia on Tuesday, April 27. You may learn more about New Covenant Schools here: www.newcovenantschools.org . My time in the chapel service with middle school and high school students there was most enjoyable. The topic for the day was the spiritual themes in C. S. Lewis' The Voyage of the Dawn Treader . The students' deep familiarity with the book was a joy to hear; one could almost argue that they told me more about the book than the other way around! Afterwards I signed copies of my new book, The Hidden Story of Narnia for a number of interested students and faculty. (By the way, the young man in the second row above, with the dark hair and big smile, Travis Elliott, contributed an endorsement which appears on the back cover of my book.) The students on the other side of the room were just as bright and good looking! As you can see below.... If you would like me to come and do a presentation on The Hidden Story of Narnia ...

Last night I was in Chattanooga, Tennessee speaking to the C. S. Lewis Society there and signing copies of my new book, The Hidden Story of Narnia . And no, I did not take the "choo choo" to get there. I just couldn't resist including the picture above. We had a great group last night, meeting at The Camp House (the storefront meeting place of a contemporary Anglican church--way cool!). We had folks travel to the event from as far away as Nashville and Alabama! There was an enthusiastic response to my presentation on the spiritual themes in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader followed by an engaging time of Q&A. We even had some young boys present who are currently reading the Narnia books and are the same age I was when I first stepped through the wardrobe door. That was neat! Here's a picture of me with the dad (Neil) who brought them.... Thanks to all who came and made it such an enjoyable evening, and special thanks to two of the greatest hosts south ...

We had a great beginning to The Hidden Story of Narnia book tour last night in Monterey, Virginia. There was quite a variety of people present from young singles to parents to grandparents. Some were long time fans of the Narnia stories. Others were encouraged by my presentation on The Voyage of the Dawn Treader to read the Narnia books for the first time. After my presentation and a wonderful time of Q&A I signed books for a number of folks.... If you would like The Hidden Story of Narnia to come to your area, e-mail me at will@willvaus.com .

There are a number of booksigning events coming up for The Hidden Story of Narnia . I will be at the Highland County Public Library in Monterey, Virginia on Tuesday, April 20 at 7 pm. You can find directions to the library here: http://highlandlibrary.homestead.com/ . On Friday, April 23, I will be speaking to the Chattanooga C. S. Lewis Society and signing books in Chattanooga, Tennessee. You can find out more information on their web site here: http://cslewischatt.blogspot.com/ . And on Tuesday, April 27, I will be speaking in chapel at New Covenant Schools in Lynchburg, Virginia. You may find out more about them here: http://www.newcovenantschools.org . If you would like me to do a presentation on The Hidden Story of Narnia and/or sign books for your book club, bookstore, school, church or other group virtually anywhere in the world I'd love to talk with you. E-mail me at will@willvaus.com .

My review of the new edition of Colin Manlove's book, C. S. Lewis: His Literary Achievement , is now posted on the HarperCollins C. S. Lewis blog. Simply click here to read it: http://booksbycslewis.blogspot.com/2010/04/c-s-lewis-his-literary-achievement.html

The Hidden Story of Narnia is now in print and available to order online from my web site using PayPal. Simply click here to order: www.willvaus.com/store . Here is more information about the book from the back cover: When ten-year-old Anne Waller from Suffolk England wrote to C. S. Lewis in 1961 with a question about The Chronicles of Narnia she never expected to receive a reply. However, not only did Lewis answer her letter, he also outlined the spiritual themes in each of the Narnia books. That letter served as inspiration for Will Vaus to write The Hidden Story of Narnia . Nearly 50 years later, Anne Waller Jenkins has written a preface for The Hidden Story , praising the author's "gift of clarity" and the "sheer joy and merriment" of his style. "This book gives great motivation and inspiration to live out my faith. It is a chance to become a true Narnian. What greater charge than--'To Narnia and the North! For Aslan!' I highly recommend...

"As this qualification suggests, to preach Christianity meant primarily to preach the Resurrection. Thus people who had heard only fragments of St. Paul's teaching at Athens got the impression that he was talking about two new gods, Jesus and Anastasis (i.e. Resurrection) (Acts xvii. 18). The Resurrection is the central theme in every Christian sermon reported in the Acts. The Resurrection, and its consequences, were the 'gospel' or good news which the Christians brought: what we call the 'gospels', the narratives of Our Lord's life and death, were composed later for the benefit of those who had already accepted the gospel . They were in no sense the basis of Christianity: they were written for those already converted. The miracle of the Resurrection, and the theology of that miracle, comes first: the biography comes later as a comment on it. Nothing could be more unhistorical than to pick out selected sayings of Christ from the gospels and to regar...

The Garden Tomb "In the earliest days of Christianity an 'apostle' was first and foremost a man who claimed to be an eye-witness of the Resurrection. Only a few days after the Crucifixion when two candidates were nominated for the vacancy created by the treachery of Judas, their qualification was that they had known Jesus personally both before and after His death and could offer first-hand evidence of the Resurrection in addressing the outer world (Acts i. 22). A few days later St. Peter, preaching the first Christian sermon, makes the same claim--'God raised Jesus, of which we all (we Christians) are witnesses' (Acts ii. 32). In the first Letter to the Corinthians St. Paul bases his claim to apostleship on the same ground--'Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen the Lord Jesus?'" C. S. Lewis, Miracles , London: Geoffrey Bles, 1947, p. 171.

'Only the Greatest of all can make Himself small enough to enter Hell. For the higher a thing is, the lower it can descend--a man can sympathise with a horse but a horse cannot sympathise with a rat. Only One has descended into Hell.' 'And will He ever do so again?' 'It was not once long ago that He did it. Time does not work that way when once ye have left the Earth. All moments that have been or shall be were, or are, present in the moment of His descending. There is no spirit in prison to Whom He did not preach.' 'And some hear him?' 'Aye.' (C. S. Lewis, The Great Divorce, London: Geoffrey Bles, 1945, p. 114) "For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit, through whom also he went and preached to the spirits in prison ..." 1 Peter 3:18-19