For the last couple years, it seemed like most of the progress in Christian speculative fiction seemed to be gained by fantasy, and young adult fantasy, at that.

At long last, there’s some good news for science fiction writers. From Sally Stuart’s (The Christian Writer’s Market Guide) blog, Christian Writers’ Marketplace, it appears that someone is finally listening:

Christian filmographers will take a detailed look at the widespread cultural impact that Science Fiction has had through film during the Fourth Annual Christian Filmmakers Academy (CFA) to be held January 5-7 in San Antonio, Texas. Following a year that saw Science Fiction movies account for 2.5 billion dollars of the 3.7 billion grossed by the top twenty films in the US, the CFA faculty will break down the great science fiction films of the past, even as they cast a vision for how Christians can rightfully employ this genre in the future.

This is good news for Christian science fiction writers and for fans as well. Be sure to read the entire announcement in Sally’s post, and I would also suggest we pray for the people in CFA.

To be honest, I’d not heard there was such a thing as a Christian filmaker’s academy, but here, in their fourth year they have identified the “cultural impact” that science fiction had through film.

It’s hard for me not to wonder why it seems to be taking the book industry so long to reach a similar conclusion. Of course, anyone involved with the business soon realizes that the industry has less to do with the speed of lightning than of glaciers. So maybe book lovers just need to hang on a little while longer.

Meanwhile, we fantasy fans are pretty happy to learn that, according to Marcus at Goodword Editing, Paradise Lost is heading into production. I love the fact that the film industry has discovered the Christian classics. Now, about the contemporary works …