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How Can They Hear?

A common complaint with Christian fiction is that it’s too preachy. Personally, I’m more apt to be dissatisfied because it’s not preachy enough. · Yvonne Anderson

Label Me The Anti-Christ or Give Me A Grilled Chessus!

I remember it well, my first novel had just been published and reviews were starting to appear on various blog posts and retail sites. To my delight the posts were almost unanimously positive. The comments were packed with kids and […] · Christopher Miller

Scary Title Alert: The Discipline Of Reading Fiction

Readers get inoculated by “fun” fiction, and no longer approach stories as vehicles of ideas, shown not told. When we as Christians do look for meaning, we are primarily looking for a Christ figure and a picture of redemption. We rarely dig deeper. · Rebecca LuElla Miller

More About Characters

The subject of characters in Christian fiction has been coming up on this blog a lot recently. I’ve appreciated E. Stephen Burnett’s excellent series “Fiction Christians From Another Planet” — Patrick Carr’s guest post about writers using real people as […] · Yvonne Anderson

Offended

One day, while I was still attending Seminary, one of my professors came in and admitted to doing something heretical. I remember it well, even fifteen years later. · John Otte

The Christian Writer and Fiction

Fiction is not very good fiction, if fiction at all, without ‘flawed characters and narrative.’ As such, the gospel-story (narrative) is the story of sinful men and women (flawed characters) coming to repentance and faith in Christ, the Redeemer, whose sacrifice atones for their sins. The narrative does not stop at the point of conversion but continues with how such persons struggle with the remaining sin within them (flawed characters, again) and the sin in the world around them. · Thomas Clayton Booher

The Christian And Stories

Should we seek to win the hard drinking and hard swearing jock by writing stories filled with drinking and swearing? Since real people do drink and swear and assault people and have affairs, since real people are prostitutes or frauds or terrorists, shouldn’t our stories show them in all their ugliness and need? · Rebecca LuElla Miller

In Which I Take The “Wrong Vehicle” Out For Another Spin

A week and a half ago, Mike Duran contended that fiction is the wrong vehicle for theology. That generated a wonderful discussion, but I didn’t enter into either conversation because I needed time to craft a careful response. Which I’ll attempt today. · Yvonne Anderson

A Meandering Thank You

Yvonne Anderson, author of the science-fiction “Gateway to Gannah” series, shares her journey to publication in her first column as a new Speculative Faith regular contributor. · Yvonne Anderson

Ingredients Of A Good Story

Whether on blogs or in conference writing instruction or how-to writing books, it seems to me there is much more discussion about point of view and avoiding passive verb constructions and steering clear of forms of “to be” than there is about what ingredients go into a good story. · Rebecca LuElla Miller

Soliloquy

In which I was inspired to mangle some Shakespeare. · Fred Warren

What’s A Work Of Fiction To Accomplish–Revisited

The question is this. Does a piece of fiction impact a reader more by ambiguity and the ensuing discussion, or by clarity? I’ve never heard a discussion about whether or not Aslan was a redemptive character. Did Lewis create a less powerful character as a result of making him clearly good, clearly redemptive? · Rebecca LuElla Miller

Sex, Violence and Dark Events

I understand that some readers are made very uncomfortable reading “graphic horror and implied sexual abuse,” but does that mean neither can ever be acceptable elements in Christian fiction, regardless of the purpose they might serve in that fiction? Should Christian authors of speculative fiction – or any fiction – refrain from putting “dark and violent things” into their novels as a matter of principle? · Karen Hancock

Done To Death: Getting It Right

Last time, I wrote about the reason why I don’t think it’s a good idea to write “milk” in Christian fiction. And I also promised to talk about some books that I think “got it right,” so to speak. So here we go. · John Otte

In Case You Were Wondering

Piggybacking on Becky’s poll, here’s a summary of the current top 10 Christian fiction bestsellers compiled by the Christian Booksellers Association (CBA) and Amazon.com as of about 2 pm CDT today. · Fred Warren

Fantasy And Overt Christianity

Should Christian writers refrain from having their characters do what Christians do — turn to Christ, pray for help, give spiritual counsel, worship with other believers, and so on? If Christians do want to show their characters acting like Christians, should their books then be confined to Christian circles? Should we indeed write for and market to Christians only? · Rebecca LuElla Miller
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