New kids book series helps parents push back against 'unhealthy' mainstream messaging
A new children’s book series seeks to help conservative parents combat what they believe to be “unhealthy messaging” their kids are being exposed to at school or through popular children’s entertainment outlets.
The new publishing company Brave Books this summer began releasing books that seek to empower “this generation’s youth with conservative values so that the next generation will be filled with strong and discerning leaders.” The series, which launched in July, aims to push back against abortion, euthanasia, gender identity, communism, critical race theory and cancel culture, among other mainstream progressive ideas.
Going forward, Brave Books will release a “new book every month authored by a different conservative icon,” including Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, conservative stand-up comedians the Hodgetwins and conservative commentator Dana Loesch.
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Released last month, the second book in the series was written by outspoken Christian conservative blogger Elizabeth Johnston, a homeschooling mother of 10 also known as the “Activist Mommy.”
Her new book, Little Lives Matter, attempts to instill respect for human life in young people and combat efforts to expose children to “unhealthy messaging.”
Johnston describes the book as a “pro-life children’s picture book for ages 1 to 11.”
The book tells the story of a bear and her beloved son, Mobi, and how the mother bear “won’t give up even when Culture the Vulture offers her an easier life.”
“I am increasingly alarmed by the harmful messaging that we see in libraries, in public schools and on social media,” Johnston told The Christian Post of her reasons for writing the book.
She cited books like Feminist Baby, I am Jazz and The GayBCs as examples of “unhealthy messaging” that is “really damaging for kids.”
“We are tired of complaining about it and decided to do something about it,” she added.
“Little Lives Matter doesn’t even talk about abortion. It is about a baby bear named Mobi, who is born with only one front paw. And Culture the Vulture is the villain of the book,” she explained. “It’s so cute, and he is trying to lie and convince mom that Mobi’s life has no value because he’s missing his front paw.”
While Culture the Vulture’s efforts to convince Mobi’s mother that his life has no value fail, the antagonist re-enters at the end of the book “trying to convince Mobi that his elderly mother’s life has no value.”
Johnston said she hopes the book will teach children the importance of unconditional love by addressing “the value of unborn life, the value of life for the disabled and the value of life for the elderly since we know that euthanasia is on the rise across the globe.”
Johnston told CP that “because we know that websites and stores like Barnes & Noble and Amazon will cancel books that are not in line with their radical leftist values,” her book and all other books published by Brave Books are only available for purchase on the publishing company’s website.
“We have created a book series that’s … uncancellable by having it on our own website," she said. "So we are not looking to be in those big-box retail stores because they cancel books like ours that promote our conservative values.”
Johnston’s book also includes activities, games and discussion questions in addition to “scriptures [on] the back.”
She contends the book is a “great resource for not only parents but homeschool teachers, Christian school teachers [and] children’s church teachers.”
Recalling recent backlash to Dr. Seuss books and the children's show “Paw Patrol," Johnston lamented that “they’re always trying to cancel the things that we love.” She pointed to Brave Books as “a long-term solution that’s not cancellable.”
Brave Books CEO Trent Talbot told CP that the company has sold “about 10,000” books so far and has 2,500 subscribers signed up to get a book every month.
Talbot said Brave Books has created its own “universe and cast of characters.” He added that “each book takes place … in … that … universe” and stressed that each book is a “standalone.”
This means that a parent could buy their children the seventh book in the series and not need to buy any others for their children to “get a lot from it.”
Little Lives Matter is the second book in “Saga 1” of Brave Books. Talbot likened a “saga” to a season of a Netflix series.
The first book, Elephants Are Not Birds by conservative influencer Ashley St. Clair, addressed the topic of gender identity. A third book expected to be published in September is titled The Island of Free Ice Cream byJack Posobiec, a former Navy intelligence officer who specialized in the Communist Chinese Party.
“We’re telling a long narrative over the course of many books and many years,” he maintained. Talbot predicted that “we’ll probably end up doing 120 books” in the span of a decade.
“That’s our plan right now is to have this be a 10-year series,” he added.
He said that if parents buy their child “the first Brave Book when they’re five years old,” the books will last “all the way until they’re 15 years old.”
With that in mind, he suggested that the “books will likely mature over the years.”
“Five years from now, they’ll be a little bit higher-level,” he said.
Talbot expressed interest in creating chapter books in the future to appeal to older children but indicated that “we don’t have any concrete plans to do that yet.”
Like Johnston, Talbot expressed concern about the messages that mainstream children’s books and programming convey.
“When my daughter Charlotte was born, I began to notice that there’s a real war going on for the hearts, minds and souls of our children," he detailed. “I thought that there needed to be … something that parents could use to push back against what the culture is pushing on our kids.”
“It seems like our culture is trying to confuse and demoralize our children, and it’s so important that as parents, our primary duty is to protect them … physically, emotionally and spiritually,” he concluded. “And it might be the best way to do that is to arm them with truth, so they can discern what’s good versus bad, what’s truth versus lies.”
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: [email protected]
