Andrew Peterson arrives endorsed by well-known author Donald Miller. Not surprisingly, Peterson is an author himself, both of children’s books and fantasy adventure stories. His music is just as literate as all of this suggests.

His lyrics are plaintive and introspective, searching for a story in everyday things as well as in the American landscape. Bruce Springsteen has been doing this kind of thing for years. So we get, “I saw the world the Lord has made / Mostly from the interstate,” and other similarly poetic sentiments.

Musically, Peterson walks the tightrope between pleasantly sincere folk and sappy romantic comedy soundtrack. When it’s bad, it brings to mind the sappy likes of The Fray, and when it’s good (which it more frequently is), it reminds me somewhat of Sting but mostly of Paul Simon, particularly his last solo album, Surprise. As usual with Christian folk or alt-country, I’m left longing for a grittier sound and less production polish, but this is still a fairly good record.

Three stars out of five