Last night at Realm Makers in Reno, Nevada, SpecFaith editor E. Stephen Burnett and Splickety Publishing Group founder Ben Wolf announced Lorehaven.

This new free webzine, from the creators of Speculative Faith and Splickety Publishing Group, will launch this autumn. Quarterly issues will offer flash reviews, articles, and news about Christian-made fantastic stories — all for the mission of building reading groups among Christian families, churches, and organizations.

The following is an adaptation of Stephen’s announcement on July 27:

Good evening!

I’m E. Stephen Burnett.

I am an editor and writer at SpeculativeFaith.com.

Since 2006, Speculative Faith has explored fantastic stories for God’s glory. We have striven to be the best place to find articles, reviews, and a complete library of Christian-made fantastical novels, found anywhere.

I also write about truth and fantasy for Christ and Pop Culture and Christianity Today.

I love fantastic stories because they help us imagine and cross into amazing worlds.

At SpecFaith, we believe in uniting worlds, including some worlds people think you can’t unite. For example:

• Our faith is that Jesus Christ is both God and man. That’s two “worlds” united. Jesus lived, died, and resurrected. He makes His dead enemies into living family.
• He will return as King to unite New Heavens and New Earth. Two worlds, united.
• We can explore both biblical truth and speculative stories. Two worlds, united.
• We believe that Christian authors can and should create fantastic stories anywhere. That may be a “secular” publisher, or any other kind of non-Christian publisher. Or it may be a Christian publisher for Christian readers. (Remember that later!)
• We believe Christians need stories. We can enjoy great stories made by Christians and made by non-Christians. Both are mixed up with God’s grace and man’s idols. Two worlds, united
• And we believe in taking these joyful ideas from the internet to the “real world.” Realm Makers? Thank God for them. That’s what they do! Five years now. We can actually go to a real-world place every year to find friends and share stories.

I’m an “evangelist” for Christian-made fantastic fiction. I tell people about these books all the time.

But when I mention them in churches, to other Christians, no one has heard about them.

We need ways to reach out to them, because they do want to read these stories. They just can’t find them. So they go to superhero movies instead, and get their fantastic “fix” in other ways. If they knew of creative, excellent, provocative Christian-made fantastic fiction, many new readers would love these novels.

Tonight, we’re happy to announce a new uniting of two worlds.

My friend Ben Wolf approached me some months ago with an idea for a new publication.

This comes from the creators of Speculative Faith and Splickety Publishing Group.

Both of these groups will still exist, under their trusted names. They will just unite.

We will also unite two other worlds: the worlds of fantastic stories and Christian fiction. (By “Christian fiction,” we mean fiction of any flavor, made by Christians.)

And most importantly, we will unite the world of Christian fantastic storytellers with the worlds of more fans and readers—the people who would love these books.

Ben and I created our top goals for this project. Here they are:

1. Market the books we love. What is the best way to help read, buy, love, and recommend the books we all love? Our top answer: help start book clubs. So we are accepting this mission. We will review books and help start book clubs in churches, schools, and anywhere. We will market your books. We will find new fans for your books.
2. For readers and fans. This is not a writers’ magazine. Realm Makers already has the Christian-fantasy-writer realm covered. Instead, we will find new fans to love your books.
3. No paid subscription. We won’t charge you to read this quarterly magazine.
4. This is a magazine. This is not a blog. We need blogs! But Lorehaven will curate content as a magazine. Ben is the publisher. I am editor-in-chief. You will get this on Kindle or smartphone apps.
5. Ads will support Lorehaven. We will use these resources to market these books into a world that’s bigger than our individual worlds and writers’ groups.

We wanted a new name to describe this publication:

Lore. We find biblical truth in fantastic stories.

• As Christians, we train to enjoy and practice these gifts from God, for His glory.
• We will offer flash reviews, book club help, stories, news, articles about how we act like Christian “fanservants,” and roundtable discussions about big issues.

Haven. Lord willing, this magazine will make a good place for Christian readers.

• We will serve you with grace, but like Aslan in Narnia, not quite “tame” or safe!
• Earlier, I said we do need Christian creators of fantastic stories everywhere.
• But Lorehaven will connect Christian creators of fantastic novels with fans who are Christians. We will connect the creative world with several worlds out there: churches, homeschool groups, private schools. We plan interviews, writing for Christian publications, and going to conferences.

Lorehaven’s first issue will launch this autumn, 2017.

Then we will release a new webzine issue every season: fall, winter, summer, spring.

Lorehaven is by Christian fans, for Christians fans. But if you are a Christian writer, wherever you’re writing, that goes double. Because we want fans to find Christian fantastic stories.

Here’s how we can help one another:

1. Visit Lorehaven.com.
2. Upload your book! It must be Christian (that’s you), fantastic (in genre), and published.
3. Sign up for the e-mail list.
4. Follow us on social media: @lorehaven, #lorehaven, and Lorehaven on Facebook.
5. Ask any of us, Ben or me, to learn more.
6. Pray for us!
7. Join our mission!

To learn more about Lorehaven or to contact Ben Wolf or E. Stephen Burnett for interviews, comment below. You can also reach out over social media. Watch SpecFaith for updates.