While our family greatly enjoyed the stories, the collection itself is very simple, allowing perhaps for the affordable cost of this edition. A table of contents is provided for each story, but no overall table of contents listing the page number for the beginning of each included book is provided, making orientation somewhat more challenging. With 541 pages it would be wonderful to know where each story ends and begins.
One illustration graces the books cover, from the third included title, Mandie and the Ghost Bandits, no interior illustrations are present. I also would have loved to see the appropriate cover included at the beginning each of the chapter books in the volume. In addition it’s easy to form the conclusion that this collection of stories missed the final edit. Simple punctuation and spelling errors occur in a number of the stories, and the Bible verse for the final story – Mandie and the Trunk’s Secret – is missing entirely. Having read a number of Bethany House titles, these oversights are very out of character for their high quality books.
At the end of the day, when pros and cons have been examined and analyzed, the ultimate question is – have my children been entertained? Have their reading horizons been expanded? Have they been encouraged to turn to God with their needs, both physical and for forgiveness?
I know that meeting Mandie and her friends has made an impact on our family’s day-to-day existence. Our orange and white tabby kitten has been renamed Snowball after Mandie’s white cat. When I finished reading the first five books in this volume to my children they both exclaimed, “More Mandie Mamma!” When my five-year-old catches sight of the book she asks, “Can we read Mandie again Mommy?” In conclusion I quote my eldest child once more, “Mommy, isn’t Mandie the bestest bedtime story book ever?”
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