Can we just nuke this? Can we finally and fully blast it to shreds? Or will there always be pieces of the monster that somehow repair themselves and lurch back to life, groaning, and head to the internet and post things like “C.S. Lewis was a heretic; hide your children!”?

I had thought to write about something else instead: that some evangelicals, with good intentions, seem to over-use Lewis, and forget that we do have other scholars, even if they’re not as creative or popular.

But then this issue came up, and for the time being, I’ve swung right back to the other side.

Sure, I still think evangelicals often over-venerate Lewis, quoting him, writing even more books about him and his works, and making yet another Life of Lewis visual documentary.

Actual quote from one Christian-conspiracy-theory website: “Pan, the pagan sex god (…) is deceitfully renamed to ‘Tumnus’ in the (‘Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe’) movie.” (I’d rather not link to that site because it could corrupt you, but I need to show it directly for a good cause, so that you will know how bad it is.)

Yet then along come other Christians who react in the opposite extreme. Perhaps they are so used to being in a minority-party status and reacting instead of acting, that they instinctively detest anything popular, suspect it of doctrinal compromise, and pass along conspiracy lies.

If this were only said by fringe types, bless ‘em, who roam Christendom and also say things like “rock music is hypnotic and the Devil’s tool” or “all Greek gods are actually demons” without Biblical proof, I could live with that. Some Christians are just nutty, and nuttiness does not revoke salvation. Surely God is waiting to surprise all of us countless times, in the New Earth.

But many carefully discerning Christians also have been deceived into believing that they should fear Lewis because he supposedly held heretical belief in universalism.

Wretched mistake

Recently, Wretched Radio lapsed into this. They’re an overall fantastic resource for Biblical truth and graciously refuting false teachers, and they recently posted an audio clip from the program in which host Todd Friel read from Kevin DeYoung’s Jan. 28 column Cautions for Mere Christianity. That was a good column; I pointed others to it myself. But Friel took it further, saying he’d call people to be even warier of Lewis’ work.

Worse, the audio clip was titled “C.S. Lewis the heretic.”

Later Friel wrote to say he would not have used the term heretic; it was accidentally used by a staffer. We can’t interview Lewis to know for sure, Friel noted.

Still the damage was done. Commentators bemoaned (mostly rightfully) all the heretics who get around, the false teachings, etc. — and so may, without hearing of other bypassed truths, miss out on some of the best writing ever used to honor God.

Mere Lewis-anity

Yes, Lewis had some issues. Don’t all Christians? Yet his were prevalent in his time and culture:

1. In Mere Christianity he was far too fuzzy on why Jesus died. As DeYoung noted, Lewis allowed for other theories about how His death brought God’s forgiveness, including the notion that God has already forgiven people, somehow, and Christ died to show it.
2. In The Problem of Pain Lewis, like many genuine Christians (including theologian B.B. Warfield in the past and theologian Wayne Grudem in the present) made up evolution-inclusive myths for God’s creation and man’s rebellion. Scripture-ignore fail.
3. Elsewhere Lewis had plenty of respect for pagan myths, which causes understandable angst among many Christians. This is actually among his lesser errors, if it’s an error at all, and requires careful discernment and reasoning about how even pagan stories can contain truth and whose hopes are fulfilled in Christ. (Where does sin originate? Does the Devil “own” all stories that ignore God? Should we avoid even knowing their details, as if they’re corrupted — and as if even the prophet Daniel would have been horribly corrupted by knowing Babylonian myths and magic practices in Daniel 1?)

But Lewis was not a universalist. He blatantly denied believing this throughout his works. Those who claim otherwise need to check to make sure they’re absolutely right in their reading. If not, they are guilty of spreading slander about a Christian, and dishonoring the God of truth.

One of Lewis’ strongest statements against the notion that someone could, after death, escape Hell, comes from his The Problem of Pain. Though problematic elsewhere, he’s right-on here:

The Divine labour to redeem the world cannot be certain of succeeding as regards every individual soul. Some will not be redeemed. There is no doctrine which I would more willingly remove from Christianity than this, if it lay it my power. But it has the full support of Scripture, and, specially, of Our Lord’s own words; it has always been held by Christendom; and it has the support of reason. If a game is played, it must be possible to lose it. […] I would pay any price to be able to say truthfully “All will be saved.” But my reason retorts, “Without their will, or with it”? […]

I said glibly a moment ago that I would pay “any price” to remove this doctrine. I lied. I could not pay one-thousandth part of the price that God has already paid to remove the fact.

[… Some Hell critics say] death ought not to be final, that there ought to be a second chance. I believe that if a million chances were likely to do good, they would be given. But a master often knows, when boys and parents do not, that it is really useless to send a boy in for a certain examination again. Finality must come some time, and it does not require a very robust faith to believe that omniscience knows when.

Next week: did C.S. Lewis use Emeth, a noble but pagan Calormene in the last Chronicles of Narnia story, The Last Battle, to suggest that all people would be saved in the end?

I  talked in my Speculating Faith article about how the speculative genre should be the safest place for writers to explore their own faith. That is to say, when there’s a ‘common grace’ readers allow their authors–a grace that should never be abused, but that exists nonetheless.

Friday night I was out with some fellow writers, and we started talking about various peeves and preferences when approaching a book or movie.  Everyone’s got them. Personally, I’m put off by characters talking too much during a fight/action sequence or an out of place ‘romantic moment,’ just for a couple examples.   It is what it is: I read fast and miss paragraphs (to the extent I’ll actually back up and reread a couple pages), so Bad Guy hitting Good Guy, followed by two paragraphs of either taunting or inner monologue about Good Guy’s mother or something, followed by Good Guy finally ducking and taking a swing at Bad Guy really makes me lose my place. Too much and I’ll forget what’s happening in the scene completely.

That said: Even good writers commit the peeves. This is because they’re peeves, not because there’s anything inherently wrong with the writing.  (Some people will argue that point with me; and I suppose that’s okay.)

Really, for the most part I’m that reader writers like: I genuinely want this book to be amazing, and I’ll keep reading in anticipation of that brilliant, blow-away ending.

But even I have peeves. I can list several movies and a few books I’ll probably never see or read again, not because they’re poorly done, but because of the peeves. I’ll recommend them to other people, likely, but not for myself.  Matter of fact, there are a couple authors (no, I’m not naming them, because it doesn’t matter) who continuously do the same two or three things that drive me crazy, but I keep buying and reading their books anyway.

This is because, in the end, they’re still good books with good plots and good characters.   And neither exists without the skill, time, and energy of the writer.  Common grace is appreciating those things despite the warts–real or perceived. Common grace doesn’t demand a brand of perfection, but instead accepts that blessings fall on all of us. It doesn’t tear down but builds up; it seeks to save, not destroy. It sees the good and accepts the ill. Such a grace accepts that writers are but mortals, and books written by mortals are only as perfect as the writer who creates them. Grace can overlook a fault; it trusts, hopes, and perseveres.

And, I don’t know. I guess I hope people would show the same grace to me.

Sorry for my tardiness. I actually forgot that I was holding the drawing for the copy of Merrie Destefano’s book Afterlife.

After assigning a random number to those who commented on Merrie’s guest post, randomizing the lot, and drawing a number randomly (notice the theme here), I’m happy to announce that the winner of Afterlife is Morgan. Congratulations!

I’ll contact you with specifics about claiming your prize.

Last week I explored some issues connected with writers knowing their audience, specifically whether or not writing to the “typical reader” of a particular kind of story locks an author into writing only that type of book. The common term for this is “branding.”

Now I’m wondering, who are these “typical readers” of Christian speculative fiction?

I’m thinking about Donita Paul’s books — Dragons of the Valley, The Vanishing Sculptor, and the DragonKeeper Chronicles. During the recent CSFF Blog Tour one of the participants coined the phrase “cozy fantasy” as a way of communicating what Donita’s stories are like. It’s a good term, I think. Clearly someone who prefers dystopian fantasy would likely not be apt to pick up a Donita Paul “cozy fantasy.” Someone looking for gritty realism in their fantasy (isn’t that an oxymoron?) probably will look elsewhere. But someone who wants to experience an imaginative world with an adventure tale that ends happily, and who wants to discover Biblical truth woven into the fabric of a story will be a huge fan.

But what about that last part, the “Biblical truth woven into the fabric of a story” part? If a story integrates Truth as the Christian knows it, does this automatically narrow the readership to those who understand Truth in the same way?

I’m thinking about this in particular because of the last two books I’ve read. One was Dragons of the Valley , a fantasy with allegorical elements. “Wulder” is clearly a representation of God and much of the story is about characters learning to know Him and trust Him. The other is general Christian fiction, Another Dawn by Kathryn Cushman. This latter book is about Christians and some real-life struggles. When I finished, I thought, This is why Christian publishers exist. The book is well written, realistic, engaging, compelling, but it’s about Christians. Would a non-Christian want to read that book? (And consequently, would a general market press consider publishing it?) It’s possible because of the central story question, but the greater internal conflict that the main character experiences is all about spiritual matters. How would someone who doesn’t know Christ relate?

So I wonder, in our science fiction, our urban fantasy, our epic fantasy, who gets the “take away”? In other words, can speculative fiction transcend the divide between those who believe the Bible to be True and those who don’t?

We know, certainly, that C. S. Lewis’s children’s fantasy has done so. But how about his science fiction? How about his fantasy treatises, The Great Divorce and Screwtape Letters? J. R. R. Tolkien would seem to have transcended the divide, though some Christians deny that The Lord of the Rings is in fact “Christian.”

Must Christians have our own peculiar brand of literature because we are a peculiar (used in the best sense of the word) people? Or can speculative fiction do what editors at writers’ conferences tell us not to do — reach everyone.

I have this idea that there are things about us humans that we hold in common. We have eternity in our hearts. We have the need for security (love), the need for significance (purpose), we are relational, communicative, creative, sinful. So my idea is, there might be stories that touch the core issues we all share — those of us who are sinful and saved and those who are sinful and lost. But maybe those stories have to be speculative fiction so that Christians and non-Christians alike feel at home.

Is it even possible to write a Christian novel without evil? Not really. I suppose one could write of unfallen other worlds, the pre-fall Garden of Eden, or of the saints in Heaven and get away with it. But that’s not the world we inhabit or anything remotely close to it. And, as a friendly, jab, best wishes on your conflict in Heaven!

To the contrary, I’d argue that evil is a central component of the Christian worldview. Any character that is genuinely Christian must face it and face it even within their own being, Wesleyan Holiness types aside. After all, who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks to E. Stephen Burnett, I’ve been presented an opportunity here to discuss some of the issues regarding evil and Christian fiction.

Christian fiction written without evil is truly a Christian fiction, in that it has no tie to reality as professed by Christians. It ceases to be Christian, outside of the possible exceptions presented above. A novel without evil is a non-Christian mythology, a way of understanding our world at the deepest levels that bears no relation to the truths taught by Christianity.

Fortunately, it’s good news that the logical problem of evil is widely thought to be solved by thinkers of all stripes, largely due to the work of Alvin Plantinga. The logical problem of evil differs from evidential or probabilistic versions of the argument in that it attempts to detect a contradiction or incoherency between the propositions God exists and evil exists. After two millennia or more, it is now commonly accepted that the proposition God may have morally sufficient reasons for allowing evil is sufficient to dispatch the logical POE.

So, the question for us as Christian writers is something along the lines of the following: do I have morally sufficient reasons for writing a Christian novel that contains evil? I think the answer is not only a resounding yes, but that evil is required. Here are some reasons why (keep in mind the above disclaimers)…

• A Christian writer ought to be faithful to the revealed Word of God, which describes our world as evil.
• For Christian writers to create characters who possess no evil qualities is tantamount to denying Scriptures such as All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

There are more we could list, but that should be adequate for the moment. The existence of evil in Christian literature is really not that contentious. What is, however, is the existence of gratuitous evil. Gratuitous evil is any evil that does not appear to have a role or purpose in the story. It is evil for evil’s sake, so to speak.

Interestingly, this is one of the philosophical reactions to the fall of the logical form of the POE discussed above. There are some forms of evil in the world, it is argued, that are gratuitous evils that God could not have a morally sufficient reason for allowing. A classic example of this is the fawn that dies horribly in a forest fire. What possible reason could be offered for this type of evil? Certainly not free will or the soul-making property of evil. Rather than offer a defense here, let’s take a moment instead to look at the problem in light of Christian fiction.

Is there an instance in your writing, or mine, where evil is inserted gratuitously? Does it serve no purpose in the development of the characters, the general tenor of the created world, the spiritual theme, or the story at large? If so, this is probably a good example of an area where evil does not belong in Christian fiction. The point is this: have solid reasons why the evil you insert into a novel is required by the world and story itself, and offered pursuant to that taught in Scripture.

But that’s not all. Intertwined with evil and fiction is the existence of violence. You may have evil without violence, but often they appear together. Is this acceptable for a Christian novel, given that the violence portrayed is not gratuitous? I believe so, and I believe it’s fairly easy to demonstrate.

The Bible is an extremely violent book. There’s Jael and the tent peg, there’s David beheading Goliath, there are bears mauling kids—young men, most likely—at the command of the prophet Elisha (those of you who taunt my thinning hair should be glad I’m not Elisha…you know who you are!), and literally hundreds of other violent acts that upset our delicate, 21^st century PC sensibilities. Even God gets in on the act with frequency: I will make my arrows drunk with blood, while my sword devours flesh.

Our choices are to accept the Bible as the authoritative, infallible, inerrant Word, including its violence, or not. I for one choose the former and think it is high time we quit making excuses for it. In like manner, as long as violence within a Christian novel is not gratuitous, is genuine with regard to the created world and story, and displays Christian truth, it is acceptable.

After all, why is the Bible so violent? The answer is simple, yet important: God cannot lie; thus, He describes our world and our hearts exactly as they are. Imagine if God had not done so out of fear he might offend someone! Heaven forbid.

Lastly, the most violent event of all time—yes, more violent than the worldwide flood that killed all but eight or the eschatological violence looming ahead—is the crucifixion, in which God poured out his wrath on His perfect son. Why? Why would God write such a violent story? And make no mistake, He did write it.

True, we are not God, so we must take utmost care when handling such powerful themes. And please hear me clearly: evil and violence are never to be glorified. They ought to be described as the hideous realities they are, and they should never be focused on solely to the exclusion of the Good. But I also believe God wishes us to tell the truth about this world, about the hearts of men, and about how His glory shines ever clearer through it all. May it be so.

Marc Schooley is a Texan, which may be empirically verified if you ever hear him speak. He is a Christian philosopher, theologian, Bible teacher, speaker, musician, and nascent Christian fiction writer who welcomes you to communicate with him at www.MarcSchooley.com, featuring quest appearances by MS Quixote—which may or may not be his alter ego (a special commission has been established to investigate this matter). His novels The Dark Man and König’s Fire blend action and paranormal twists with in-depth characters and Christian doctrines.

Not long ago I made a New Year’s Resolution that disgusted me. To myself I’d said: “Self, this year you hope to write a novel based in part on the theme of we all by nature crave to be the saviors of our own worlds. If you want to delve deeper into this mindset, you will likely need to read some books by those who, sad to say, provide bad examples of this exact view.”

I tried to argue, but the facts won. In coming months, I felt I would need to read: The Shack.

Why? Because despite all its other issues, many of which have been documented here on Spec-Faith and also in-depth by Becky Miller on her site, The Shack remains a stellar example of even worse underlying untruths. For in its mirror universe, where Spock has a goatee and God the Father manifests not only as a human but as a woman (tee hee, so naughty!), “God” exists to serve man, as if He needs him. Even orthodox Christians fall into this on occasion. I know I do.

You may have already caught on to my past tense. Call me cruel, but I already didn’t wish to pay for The Shack. Instead I hoped to bum a copy off some awkwardly placed Christian brother or sister who’d been given the gift (because, the giver may say, I know you’re Spiritual and Like Books, so naturally you’ll love this Book that I’ve heard is very Spiritual!).

Now, however, I don’t need to read The Shack at all. Instead I’ve settled, by accident, for a little devotional that was last year’s bestselling Christian book: Jesus Calling. I’m sure its author meant the best in her “listening” to Jesus every day, then writing whatever she felt He was saying to her. Where it gets confusing is how Christ’s “speaking” to her somehow also applies to other readers who weren’t, personally, listening themselves. Even more confusing: why try this at all? Does Scripture reveal this is some ability we can expect with the Presence of God?

Anyway, I’ve reviewed Jesus Calling in part 1 and (as of Friday morning) part 2. Yet here, let’s explore a related matter: the book author’s (again, I’m sure well-intentioned) use of several Scripture verses in her devotionals. While writing in the first-person and relaying apparent new words from Jesus, she italicizes several phrases from the old Word, several translations. Like so:

You are my beloved child. I chose you before the foundation of the world, to walk with Me along paths designed uniquely for you.

This is an error I’ve seen a lot, and hope to Heaven to avoid repeating: salvaging Scripture for our own story parts. And this can apply to nonfiction and fiction alike.

Here, a piece of Ephesians 1:4 is present, but severely weakened by being placed in a foreign context: the author, apparently trying to improve on the promise, constricts its meaning to be only about walking along “paths designed uniquely.” That’s not what Paul was saying. Instead the apostle laid the foundation of the Gospel: that God chose His own from the beginning “that we should be holy and blameless before him,” predestined for adoption as God’s sons according to His will, “to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.”

This is far better than simply being chosen to walk a particular path. And I’m confused by why so many people have apparently felt the revision is an improvement on the original promise.

Jesus Calling is meant as nonfiction. But it does the same thing I’ve seen in many Christian fiction novels, as I’m sure you have as well: approaching Scripture like a pile of scrap parts, taking what we like for our own preferred goals, and leaving the rest.

Many objections can be raised to this, yet the first one might be an almost “secular” argument: we don’t or shouldn’t treat any other book that way. So why treat the Bible that way?

No one takes Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice and writes all-new love letters “from” him “to” you personally. At least, not yet.

Before reading, there’s an invisible contract one signs with an author. You may use the material in your own mind, dwell upon it, try to find some Secret Meanings and even write about them if you like, tell friends, recommend or criticize the work. But in return a reader must show respect by yielding an author the honor of setting the rules for his own book. So if he says his stories are based on Supposal but include allegorical elements, we mustn’t go treating it like Allegory alone and ignore the definition of Supposal. If the novel is a fantasy, readers must not read it and say “that’s ridiculous, dragon-riding/magic/teleporting isn’t real.” And there’s a word for those who read, say, The Lord of the Rings for their own discourteous purposes, and from it steal names like Valinor or Lothlorien to use in their own stories: plagiarism.

Another example: I kept up with the recent and fascinating reviews of author (and Spec-Faith contributor) Susanne Lakin’s book The Wolf of Tebron. No, I still haven’t read the book myself. But some of those reviews confused me, for they seemed to say, “As soon as you stop reading it for the allegory and only like a fairy tale, it works better.” And yet what I’d understood from the author is that Wolf was intended to be an allegorical fairy tale. Is that an author rule we should follow? Or perhaps I missed something and should be informed in the comments?

If human authors’ intentions and genre guidelines are worth respect from readers, then surely God as Author, His intentions and reading Scripture rightly, are all worth even more.

Yet some novels’ flagrant misuse of Scripture and Biblical concepts, using only scraps of it to fit sporadically into another story, is dubious. And it shows a disrespect or at least a disquieting nonchalance about the sacredness of the Word: hey, thanks for the holy revelation about what You’re like and what You’ve been up to with that whole Gospel thing and all, but I really, really want instead to make this craft project, and this bit here about morality is exactly what I need.

When I was a teenager and beginning to try novel-writing, I did this same thing. At the front of each chapter I put Scripture verses, partial and out of context, and often about things teenage Christian evangelicals tend to fancy, such as Fighting Spiritual Battles and Defending the Faith and et cetera. This made me feel spiritual. But I was treating the Word like a salvage pile.

Not only that, but I was making the story even sillier. What it needed was not bits and pieces of Biblical language tacked on. Rather, God-honoring stories need writers who love God on His own terms, not ours, and approach His Word with humble ambition to learn it and use it rightly.

So here’s a far better resolution to make: I should not want to read Scripture as a salvage pile with useful materials for my own little craft projects. Instead God wants me to be more “selfish” while reading His Word — I should want more of Him personally and to become daily more like Him. To take that lightly doesn’t give anyone a better relationship with God or better visionary stories. And at the very least, it does not respect the Author’s right to set His own reading rules.

In her post of yesterday, Becky Miller asked a frightening question:

Can a writer get locked into a world, a series, or a genre because of reader expectation? Or will readers trust an author they love and follow her as she ventures into other lands, with other characters? For example, can J. K. Rowling ever write anything besides Harry Potter?

Are we as readers so demanding and narrow-minded that we would actually lock an author into a category and refuse to let him out? Maybe we are. Robin McKinley has written things besides fairy-tale adaptations, but I can’t really be bothered to read them. J.R.R. Tolkien wrote a book about Father Christmas, but what Middle-earth fans want to read that? I can be totally riveted to a series by a contemporary author and really not give a hoot when he tweets about some other book he’s working on.

I am eclectic sort f person with an eclectic lot of story ideas, so frankly, this whole concept is scary to me. But then I thought, you know, maybe it’s a compliment when a reader doesn’t want to let you out. When, if you want to write in some other genre, you have to do it under a pen name.

Because the best books, and the best characters, and the best worlds, take on lives of their own. They’re not about the author at all anymore.

It’s just possible that nobody cares what J.K. Rowling writes if she doesn’t write about Harry Potter because she has faded so far back into the woodwork that readers don’t even think about her; they just think about Harry. And really, that’s an amazing compliment. Someone she cobbled together out of ink and imagination has become so truly alive to readers that he eclipses her. As for J.R.R. Tolkien–shoot, everyone knows that Middle-earth is real.

The best authors write book after book and series after series, and they all take on their own lives. Eventually, they work magic so many times that we say we love the author, but of course, we don’t even know them. We love their work for its own sake.

So maybe it’s not really about demanding readers. Maybe it’s about good writing–really, really good writing–and its power to transport and transform readers until they don’t want to leave the lands and people they love.

This week the CSFF Blog Tour is featuring Dragons of the Valley, book two in the Chiril Chronicles by Donita Paul, winner of the first Clive Staples Award. It struck me as I was reading this story that one of Ms. Paul’s strengths as a writer is that she knows her audience.

Mind you, that audience is not some neatly defined niche. From the beginning of her foray into fantasy, Ms. Paul’s books have been marketed to “all ages.” And while this, like the others on her fantasy shelf, is published by a Christian house (WaterBrook), her books reach a span of readers, from Christians to seekers and those not opposed to Christianity.

So who exactly is her audience? I think I can construct a profile of her readers by looking at similarities in her stories.

Ms. Paul’s audience consists of people who like inventive “quest tales” with strong Christian themes. They enjoy “light fantasy” that avoids delving deeply into the dark recesses of evil, yet provokes thought. Her readers prefer stories that illuminate character more than track frenetic action. And her audience enjoys dragons — many different varieties. In short they love her world, with the seven high and seven low races; her characters that include some fun, quirky individuals; her stories that don’t glorify violence; and her spiritual depth that shows God to be intimately involved with Mankind.

Even as I write up this audience profile, I have some questions. Can a writer get locked into a world, a series, or a genre because of reader expectation? Or will readers trust an author they love and follow her as she ventures into other lands, with other characters? For example, can J. K. Rowling ever write anything besides Harry Potter?

I’m also wondering if formulaic writing stems from trying to write what an audience expects, and if so, how can an author keep from disappointing his readers, yet avoid falling into the “prairie romance pit” (also called the “Nancy Drew story design” 😉 )?

I think Ms. Paul shows us some of the answers. First is inventiveness. She’s constructed a big world which gives her room to add more continents and countries with varying cultural aspects. And she has multiple races, allowing her to feature different ones in different books. For example, the kimens, featured prominently in Dragons of the Valley, have unique characteristics from the other races readers have seen close up in earlier books.

Another thing that keeps Ms. Paul’s stories from becoming formulaic is plot variation. I might even say, plot growth. In my estimation, Ms. Paul continues to improve as a storyteller. Her plots, while retaining the quest aspect her readers are looking for, do not feel like a repeat of any other quest. There are twists and variations that make this new quest feel one of a kind.

On the flip side, an author who knows her audience must not do an about face on any of the elements her readers expect. For example, Ms. Paul’s books have become increasingly realistic, especially in the area of physical confrontations. And yet, violence is still downplayed. If this were not so, I suspect a good number of her readers would feel let down. In the same way, a story starting out in the typical “light fantasy” way her audience expects, could not become a dark tale without losing readers.

In the end, I think the secret to writing consistent fiction without falling into a formula is for an author to write stories he loves. Others who love the same kinds of stories will become his readership. In this way, the author can grow and change, and the audience will grow and change right along with him.

If you’re interested in seeing what participants in the CSFF Blog Tour for Dragons of the Valley are saying, visit these bloggers in the next few days:

Gillian Adams * Noah Arsenault * Amy Bissell * Red Bissell * Justin Boyer * Grace Bridges * Beckie Burnham * Morgan L. Busse * CSFF Blog Tour * Amy Cruson * D. G. D. Davidson * April Erwin * Amber French * Andrea Graham * Katie Hart * Ryan Heart * Bruce Hennigan * Becky Jesse * Cris Jesse * Jason Joyner * Julie * Carol Keen * Emily LaVigne * Shannon McDermott * Matt Mikalatos * Rebecca LuElla Miller * Joan Nienhuis * John W. Otte * Donita K. Paul * Sarah Sawyer * Chawna Schroeder * Tammy Shelnut * Kathleen Smith * James Somers * Fred Warren * Phyllis Wheeler * Dave Wilson

Organic World Building, Or Avoiding The Stereotypical Speculative Fiction Wormhole
by Merrie Destefano

With twenty years’ experience in publishing, Merrie Destefano left a 9-to-5 desk job as the editor of Victorian Homes magazine to become a full-time novelist with HarperCollins. Her first novel, Afterlife: The Resurrection Chronicles, is available now and her second novel, Feast: Harvest of Dreams, releases on June, 28, 2011. She loves to camp in the mountains, walk on the beach, watch old movies and listen to alternative music—although rarely all at the same time. Born in the Midwest, she now lives in Southern California with her husband, their two German shepherds and a Siamese cat.

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To get this party started, I’m going to give away a signed copy of my novel, Afterlife: The Resurrection Chronicles, to one of the people who posts a comment below. [Drawing to be held and winner announced, a week from today.]
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Everything seems to be going organic lately—from produce in the grocery store to fabrics in your clothing to ingredients in your soap. Even books, which seemed pretty organic to me to begin with since they were made from paper, are now available in a more earth-friendly version—electronic. Personally, as a health nut and a person with multiple allergies, I like this organic revolution and I hope it’s here to stay.

But what about your writing?

What if you took this whole organic process a step further and applied it to your writing, especially as it relates to world building? Most of the readers of this blog either read or write science fiction and fantasy, so to us, world building is crucial to creating a believable story, right? When we buy a book, we expect the world to have a natural, realistic, believable structure or we don’t want to read it. And that’s the last thing we, as writers, want—for someone to put down our book because one element didn’t ring true.

So, below is a list of some of the organic, world-building rules that this writer tries to live by:

1. Set up your world so that it can have a natural evolution. For instance, try changing just one thing within our existing world—like P.D. James did in The Children of Men, where suddenly, no one could have children—then see how, over time, that one change could affect everything else in the world.

2. These changes could be subtle or they could be drastic. But spend time considering how this one change could effect our culture, from politics to religion to social mores. In my book, Afterlife, I created a technology where we could resurrect instead of die and this had a trickle-down effect on nearly everything, including major world religions. I didn’t realize it until I started working on the book, but death is a very significant part of our lives.

3. Reveal these changes to the reader. But do it carefully, gently, clue by clue, throughout your story. Reveal the world in bits and pieces, a little snippet here and there. Make it a mystery and remove the veil, one layer at a time. This way the reader is never overwhelmed or pulled out of the story. Remember, story is king. All the pretty writing and deep, tortured characters in the world cannot replace story.

4. Please note that your characters should not be surprised by this different world. They won’t be amazed by flying cats or talking squirrels. With the exception of a visitor from another time or world, your characters will have lived in this world for their entire lives. If anything, they will be jaded, weary, frustrated and irritated by it—not surprised. Just like we get irritable when we’re stuck in traffic, they might get irritable if they have to wait two weeks for a skin graft that would allow them to grow a third arm.

5. Your metaphors and similes must be in keeping with your new and different world. For instance, you can’t use a phrase like, “The days flew past, like pages turning in a great book,” if your story takes place in a culture where everything is written on scrolls. Likewise, if your main character is a dog who lives on Venus, he isn’t going to think about Astro on the Jetsons.

6. When built correctly, your world should have a domino effect. One thing will cause another thing to happen and so on. Keep the big picture in mind at all times. Even though you may be writing a story that feels like a microcosm—because it involves only a few characters and takes place over a few days in time—remember that there is always a macrocosm lurking behind it. Both pictures, big and small, need to be believable and they need to work together. For instance, you can’t have an apocalyptic world where zombies have taken over, without addressing how humans are still getting their food supply. If zombies are everywhere, we wouldn’t still have items like bread, because grain requires large open fields and these fields would be nearly impossible to guard and/or harvest.

So, there you have it. My six, handy-dandy, world building tips. What about you? What writing rules do you try to live by when world building? And how do you avoid that stereotypical speculative fiction wormhole: the information dump?

And to Becky and the rest of the Speculative Fiction staff, thank you so much for inviting me here today!