1. I agree, I think. But there’s another factor going on here. I read many books for sheer entertainment. I don’t want bummer endings. I want good to triumph, and the bad to be dealt with. I want the couple to get together legally with no hanky-panky beforehand. If you’re writing escapist stuff, like fantasy, I’ll complain loudly if you do not give that to me. Now, if you’re writing about reality—speculatively, I expect the unexpected. A spouse may be killed [though if they are believers I expect a little jealousy that the other got to go home first]. 😉 For us, death is a good thing, we get to go home. For the bad guys, it’s the fiery road. Let’s make spiritual warfare real, physical warfare only if unavoidable, and emotional battles a realistic depiction of the risks involved in giving into emotions and falling away from faith.

    Hopefully that was worth 2cents

    • One of my presumed truths at SpecFaith is that “sheer entertainment” is actually more “entertaining,” that is it brings more joy, when this desire and action are specifically harnessed as acts of worship for the glory of God. I think that some Christians who say they enjoy things for “sheer entertainment” are doing this without knowing it — though they often say they only enjoy the entertainment. 🙂

  2. Good article on how stories can help us to finally see things.

    One of my favorite examples of this is “Till We Have Faces” – which is, in my opinion, C. S. Lewis’s most brilliant novel. It’s a retelling of the myth of Cupid and Psyche, and the world is presented as pagan: gods and human sacrifice.

    The book is written in first-person, as Orual’s complaint against the gods. She spends the narrative scrupulously laying down her case against them, and she seems so right. Then Lewis knocks out the ground from under her.

    Atheists, unbelievers – even Christians in hard times – have wanted to make their own complaints against God. This retelling of a pagan myth shows powerfully how we can seem so right in our complaints and yet be so wrong.

    “Till We Have Faces” reminds me of the Book of Job. Job wanted to put his case before – and against – God, as Orual did. They never really received an explanation for what happened to them, but both were satisfied in the end. “Before your face questions die away.”

    • Galadriel says:

      I really like Till We Have Faces,, especially because Lewis uses the unreliable narrator so well. An insightful reader will begin to question Orual’s judgment before she does, but the moment where she realizes how she really treated Pysche–wow.

What do you think?