The "dry bones" of the title are the critical equipment of the Christian scholar, wrestling with Bible and tradition; and the "life" they may or may not be capable of is the enriching of that Christian perspective on things which transforms and renews the possibilities of action and imagination. So Dr Young is as passionate about the seriousness of professional, painstaking scholarship as she is about the need for a pastorally nourishing theology...The book overall illustrates the creative reappropriation of several levels of the Christian heritage movingly described in particular instances in the concluding chapter. It is an impressive and attractive book, written with clarity and warmth in equal measure, a rare thing' (Theology).