Although fundy sermon illustrations may contain any amount of cartoonish death, gore, and sins of multiple varieties, the rest of fundyland fiction tends to be of the extremely anemic variety. The basic problem with fundy fiction is that everyone acts like a fundy. Every character from the hero, to his ever-so-chaste love interest, to the bank robbing villain with the black mustache follow a rigid code of conduct that includes the following rules:
– Nobody ever swears using actual swear words. If someone does swear it’s always a bad guy and they get by with merely yelling “I’M SWEARING NOW!” Even this must be kept to a minimum.
– Shooting people is allowed (this is America, after all!), however, before anyone dies of a gunshot wound they must first receive the plan of salvation, pray the sinners prayer, rejoice in their new found faith, write a five page letter to their mother letting her know that they died a Christian, and then sing a hymn as they gracefully expire with the joy of Jesus on their face.
– Rape, child abuse, and other such unpleasant things don’t exist. Also, there are no gay people anywhere in the entire world.
– If the hero is forced to enter a bar or drinking establishment he’ll order milk. (Straight up. On the Rocks. With a Twist.) Any person who dares to even sip the demon rum must immediately become a drunk and end up living in the gutter as a warning to others. In keeping with realism, the trip from first sip to gutter takes approximately 6.8 minutes. Even faster if music and dancing are involved.
– It’s ok to have gaping plot holes. These can be easily resolved using a series of unlikely coincidences which can easily be made acceptable by having some character label them Divine Providence. “So, we found little Johnny a transplant kidney in a cooler that someone left in Lost and Found and then stumbled over a buried pirate treasure to pay for his operation….isn’t God good?”
– Someone must do a complete Romans Road presentation to someone else no matter how much this strains the dialog and pacing. “You know, as we’re here perched on top of this speeding train trying to defuse a nuclear bomb, I can’t help but wondering if we died today if you know for sure where you’ll spend eternity. Here, hold my wire cutters whilst I dig out my New Testament…”
– Everybody but the Designated Sinner in the plot must get a happy ending. Everyone gets saved. The hero gets the girl (they may even get to kiss once they’ve been married for a few months). The Designated Sinner gets his comeuppance but then will likely repent in dust and ashes and will end up becoming a missionary to the Congo once he’s done serving his twenty-five-to-life.
Indeed. I never even heard of that name until fairly recently.
Eh, that was supposed to be a response to “Where did she get a very contemporary name like Breanna?”
“Sadly, most of the best-sellers in Christian bookstore are not worth the paper they’re written on.”
True of much/most of contemporary fiction, period. Sadly, ‘Christian Fiction’ seems to aim to compete with what passes for writing currently.
Does Umberto Eco count as Christian? If so, I ‘ll grant that there’s at least one living Christian author actually putting out actual literature, as opposed to cereal-box text with Jesus thrown in.
Sorry for the harshness. I love to read good fiction. The misnomer ‘Christian Fiction’ is one of my pet peeves. 🙄
The bit about ordering milk on the rocks with a twist reminded me of one of my favorite movie moments. In “The Road to Utopia,” Bob Hope and Bing Crosby are impersonating a dreaded pair of murderous outlaws. Everybody in the bar backs away, and Hope goes up to the bartender and orders “Lemonade!” Everybody stares in shock. Hope recognizes his faux pas and tries to correct it: “In a dirty glass!” he snarls.
You got the reference. 🙂
i judge you for having read enough of these rags to write this post.
Nice posting, Darrell. I recognize the story type immediately; our own church’s “book giveaway” table is heavy with these American Evangelical answers to Harlequin and their ilk. I particularly like the term “bonnet rippers.” And after perusing the aisles of our local “Christian Book Stores,” I recognized the same thing that others have commented upon – that Christian fiction, especially Christian romance fiction, has both narrowed and proliferated. There are more nd more titles, and yet fewer and fewer themes, points of view, or apparent original ideas. What little I knew from dipping into the works of such contemporary “Christian writers” as could be found there also left me with the conviction that for many authors, the primary qualification was their membership in the American Evangelical community – the books were not well-written, edited, or even typeset. It sure looked like the whole business of publishing for Christians had become a ghetto for substandard and cliched writing.
But then I went to a secular bookstore. I considered the racks of Halrequin-ish romances, the stacks o mysteries that were clearly ground out on schedule, the fantasy and science fiction books (ever looked for a book in that genre that ISN’T part of a series?), and the “young adult” sections that are now 87% stories about vampires and werewolves – really? And I saw that this was no different. The things which are known to have recently sold are slavishly imitated, without regard to quality. Good authors with something new to say can make changes to the stream of stuff being frantically published, but it’s like one person rerouting a river. Publishers are looking for a assured return on thier dollar in costs, and they are dictating more and more of the content authors are producing. Years ago, the author Jack Chalker made this point clear in discussing his future projects: when proposing a new book, he invariably got a request for YA sequel to one of his best-selling series. The combination of shrinking margins, dropping serious readership, and improved demographic analysis has produced a mega mass culture: we all quote the same movies, read the same stories, listen to the same music, play the same games, etc. In order to increase sales, publishers are in the business now of creating what amounts to carbon copies of past successes.; And they do sell. I think I’m looking forward to this aspect of the post-literate culture; as the number of readers drops dramatically, the pressure to produce more of the same will drop as well. Books will be harder to find, but the average quality will rise. I hope.
As to the question of “Christian” art forms == whatever the evangelical machine is pushing this week, it’s a sign of cultur
Excellent point about how secular books are also often substandard. (Totally agree about the vampire/werewolf proliferation in YA lit – gag!) It is sad that Christian lit. has “fewer themes, points of view, or apparent original ideas.” When I find something interesting AND well-written, I jump at it, but I seem to have to drudge through a lot of drek to find it.
Nice posting, Darrell. I recognize the story type immediately; our own church’s “book giveaway” table is heavy with these American Evangelical answers to Harlequin and their ilk. I particularly like the term “bonnet rippers.” And after perusing the aisles of our local “Christian Book Stores,” I recognized the same thing that others have commented upon – that Christian fiction, especially Christian romance fiction, has both narrowed and proliferated. There are more nd more titles, and yet fewer and fewer themes, points of view, or apparent original ideas. What little I knew from dipping into the works of such contemporary “Christian writers” as could be found there also left me with the conviction that for many authors, the primary qualification was their membership in the American Evangelical community – the books were not well-written, edited, or even typeset. It sure looked like the whole business of publishing for Christians had become a ghetto for substandard and cliched writing.
But then I went to a secular bookstore. I considered the racks of Halrequin-ish romances, the stacks o mysteries that were clearly ground out on schedule, the fantasy and science fiction books (ever looked for a book in that genre that ISN’T part of a series?), and the “young adult” sections that are now 87% stories about vampires and werewolves – really? And I saw that this was no different. The things which are known to have recently sold are slavishly imitated, without regard to quality. Good authors with something new to say can make changes to the stream of stuff being frantically published, but it’s like one person rerouting a river. Publishers are looking for a assured return on thier dollar in costs, and they are dictating more and more of the content authors are producing. Years ago, the author Jack Chalker made this point clear in discussing his future projects: when proposing a new book, he invariably got a request for YA sequel to one of his best-selling series. The combination of shrinking margins, dropping serious readership, and improved demographic analysis has produced a mega mass culture: we all quote the same movies, read the same stories, listen to the same music, play the same games, etc. In order to increase sales, publishers are in the business now of creating what amounts to carbon copies of past successes.; And they do sell. I think I’m looking forward to this aspect of the post-literate culture; as the number of readers drops dramatically, the pressure to produce more of the same will drop as well. Books will be harder to find, but the average quality will rise. I hope.
As to the question of “Christian” art forms == whatever the evangelical machine is pushing this week, it’s a sign of cultural consolidation. There are undoubtedly Christian writers and other artists at work in every genre – I commend John C. Wright in addition to Michael Flynn in the F&SF writing arena. I had fun recently when driving youth group members somewhere: the radio had been left on a classical station for the entire trip. One girl finally asked, “Can we listen to some Christian music?” My reply: “It is. Franz Josef Haydn.” 😎 She had a hard time wrapping her head around the idea that someone that wasn’t playing on her favorite radio station could be a Christian artist. (Yo Yo Ma, anyone?) I didn’t bring up the devout Haendel and his weakness for sopranos – I think I had stretched her mind enough for one day.
oops – I apprently accidentally posted part way through my rant. My apologies.
I did wonder why you cut off in the middle of a sentence, but you still wrote enough for me to comment on!
Lori Wick. Ug. My sister loaned a bunch to me and said they were wonderful, HAD to read them. Each one had the same plot. Boy meets girl, one is unsaved. Once that person gets saved they get married and then they have a baby, happily ever after. She gave them to me to somehow cheer me up after I lost my baby. They made me cry.