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Please Return to the Lands of Luxury
Reviews, Mar 24, 2023

154. What If You Had to Fake Being Genetically Modified? | Enhanced with Candace Kade
Fantastical Truth Podcast, Mar 21, 2023

Exile
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Enhanced, Candace Kade
Bear Knight, James R. Hannibal
The Wayward, Tabitha Caplinger
Fortified, V. Romas Burton
Canaan Sleeps, Daniel Camomile
Silver Bounty, Victoria McCombs
A Sword for the Immerland King, F. W. Faller
Calor, J. J. Fisher
Once Upon A Ren Faire, A. C. Castillo
The Genesis 6 Project, Michael Ferguson
Exile, Loren G. Warnemuende
Aberration, Cathy McCrumb
The Truth Beyond the Lies, Kathleen Bird
Frost, Winter's Lonely Guardian, E. E. Rawls
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154. What If You Had to Fake Being Genetically Modified? | Enhanced with Candace Kade
Fantastical Truth, Mar 21, 2023

153. When Can Deconstructionism Threaten Christian Fiction? | with Michael Young aka ‘Wokal Distance’
Fantastical Truth, Mar 14, 2023

152. How Can Christian Fantasy Fans Heal from Church Trauma? | with Marian Jacobs and L. G. McCary
Fantastical Truth, Mar 7, 2023

151. How Can Fantastical Satire Sharpen Our Theology? | The Pilgrim’s Progress Reloaded with David Umstattd
Fantastical Truth, Feb 28, 2023

150. Is the U.S. Government Covering Up Spy Balloons or Alien Spaceships? | with James R. Hannibal
Fantastical Truth, Feb 21, 2023

149. Why Do Christian Fiction Fans Love So Much Romance?
Fantastical Truth, Feb 14, 2023

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Prince Caspian
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Please Return to the Lands of Luxury
“Jon Tilton explores complex topics like memory loss, personal and societal responsibility in this light sci-fi story.”
—Lorehaven on Mar 24, 2023

Exile
“This gentle fantasy from Loren G. Warnemuende shows little magic or strange creatures, focusing on complex emotions and relationships.”
—Lorehaven on Mar 17, 2023

Illusion
“Frank Peretti’s last novel creates a romantic world with sci-fi flourishes where likeable heroes, villain twists, and familiar places sell a dramatic performance.”
—Lorehaven on Mar 10, 2023

War in Heaven
“Charles Williams’s classic supernatural thriller pairs a deeply spiritual worldview with perceptive examinations of human nature.”
—Lorehaven on Mar 3, 2023

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Lorehaven helps Christian fans explore fantastical stories for Christ’s glory: fantasy, science fiction, and beyond. Articles, the library, reviews, podcasts, gifts, and the Lorehaven Guild community help fans discern and enjoy the best Christian-made fantastical stories, applying their meanings to the real world Jesus Christ calls us to serve. Subscribe free to get any updates you choose and to access the Lorehaven Guild.
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Lorehaven Launch: Enter the Review Chief

Lorehaven issue 1 launches this spring. Get to know our crew, including review chief Austin Gunderson.
E. Stephen Burnett on Mar 20, 2018
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This spring, we’ll release the first issue of Lorehaven magazine.

In this groundbreaking digital publication, we’ll review and help you find only the best Christian-made fantastical novels. We will also find truth in these fantastic stories, with cover stories, articles, Roundtable discussions about hot topics, and beyond.

Email subscribers keep rolling in. At first, they’ll get to read the magazine exclusively. You can join this fine quest party, and show your support for this new ministry.

Here at SpecFaith, I’ve been announcing the crew behind this launch. To date, we have:

  • Stephen Burnett, editor in chief;
  • Elijah David, editor.
Black v Blue.

It’s an “exquisite superhero theodicy.”

Next comes a name familiar to SpecFaith readers. He’s written some of the most in-depth and popular reviews we’ve featured, including his reviews of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, the controversial film Noah, and author Kerry Nietz’s Darktrench Saga.

Name, role, and crew

Austin Gunderson is review chief of Lorehaven magazine.

Austin was born and raised in western Washington state, where the shining summers were for playing mock-war in the woods and the somber winters were for reading. He met Kay, his future wife, at a college swing dance. They married in 2013, and in 2017 welcomed a daughter, Marit.

Personal log

For Austin, storytelling is both passion and occupation. By day he works as a video editor for a Seattle-area ad agency; by night he writes high fantasy. He believes stories are vital to human life: it’s through them that we interpret the world, and by them that we become conscious of things greater than ourselves.

When he’s not crafting or ingesting a story, Austin enjoys board games, the wilderness, and the shooting sports.

Mission

Raised in a Christian home, Austin prayed the sinner’s prayer at age five. He has since been working out the implications of that simple declaration of trust. He believes the gospel is the ur-story, the ultimate hero’s journey, and the Champion who wrote it in his own blood is also a king who demands fealty.

Austin has alternately attended Presbyterian, Assemblies of God, and Baptist churches, and part of his experience in the Body of Christ has been the discovery of its potential for corruption. But by God’s grace he’s gotten back on the horse, so to speak. Both he and Kay were involved in Chi Alpha Christian Fellowship in college, and are now members of a local CMA church.

New worlds

Epic fantasy is Austin’s first fiction love. He cut his teeth on Brian Jacques’ Redwall series, then encountered The Lord of the Rings at age twelve. As soon as he turned the last page, he began it again, in awe of a secondary world so vast and deep that it overspilled his memory.

Since then he’s devoured the works of Frank Peretti, Tad Williams, Patrick Rothfuss, Brandon Sanderson, C.S. Lewis, Orson Scott Card, Lois McMaster Bujold, and Bernard Cornwell. He particularly loves fantasy that doesn’t attempt to out-Tolkien Tolkien (the old master can’t be beat). And his labor of love over the past decade has been his own as-of-yet-unpublished high fantasy series.

Home base

Austin wrote dozens of book and film reviews as well as many articles at Speculative Faith.

However, aside from these and the scattered vestiges of a few derelict blogs, Austin’s presence online is practically undetectable. (This bio will self-destruct in thirty seconds.)

Next week—enter the book club coordinator, Steve Rzasa.

E. Stephen Burnett
E. Stephen Burnett creates sci-fi and fantasy novels as well as nonfiction, exploring fantastical stories for God’s glory as publisher of Lorehaven.com and cohost of the Fantastical Truth podcast. As the oldest of six, he enjoys connecting with his homeschool roots by speaking at conferences for Christian families and creators. Stephen is coauthor of The Pop Culture Parent: Helping Kids Engage Their World for Christ from New Growth Press (2020, with Ted Turnau and Dr. Jared Moore). Stephen and his wife, Lacy, live in the Austin area, where they help with foster parenting and serve as members of Southern Hills Baptist Church.
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Lorehaven helps Christian fans explore fantastical stories for Christ’s glory: fantasy, science fiction, and beyond. Articles, the library, reviews, podcasts, gifts, and the Lorehaven Guild community help fans discern and enjoy the best Christian-made fantastical stories, applying their meanings to the real world Jesus Christ calls us to serve. Subscribe free to get any updates you choose and to access the Lorehaven Guild.
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