Christianity In Fantasy

    What makes something a "Christian fantasy"?

    As a new author looking to publish her first book, a devoted Christian, and someone who really wants to combine those two things, this topic is something I think I know a good deal about--but as usual, everything I say here is my own opinion, and you can take it or leave it. I respect your agency. :)

    A lot of so-called "Christian fantasy" attempts to earn the title by representing what I'll call "The New Convert's Journey". Basically, you have your main character, and somehow, they get into some kind of trouble. In doing so, they fall in with a bunch of people, who may or may not be magicians of some kind, who tell them about this higher power that fuels all their magic. As the story progresses, the main character grows more and more reliant on this higher power, and their magic grows stronger, and at the end of the story, there's a big face-off between this newborn saint and whatever representation of Evil or the Devil exists in this fantasy world. The character is tempted, almost falls, turns back to the 'God Equivalent' and overcomes the 'Satan Equivalent' in a big rush of magic.

    It's like the old Hero's Journey plot structure, but in this case it's heavily Christianity-centric. This isn't a problem, and I actually own books that follow this pattern because I thoroughly enjoyed reading them, but it's not the way I want to structure my own stories.

    See, the biggest problem I have with this structure is that, inevitably, there's going to be preachy moments. This main character is a new convert, after all, so they need to get a crash course on what their new magic system/religion is all about, and in the process, the author throws in their own Christian opinions. Most of the time, it comes off as preachy and holier-than-thou, not because the author is actually that prideful, but because they are, in my opinion, going about this the wrong way.

    Assuming I've done my job right, this is the point where you're really itching to know what I think the right way is. So let me explain.

    First, the reason the other way doesn't work: The moment an average reader feels like they're getting preached at, they're going to put the book down. People don't usually like feeling belittled because they don't believe something, and preachy bits are some of the trickiest pieces of Christian fantasy to accomplish effectively--and as a result, most of them get done poorly. This is why I don't like the traditional "New Convert's Journey" found in Christian fantasy. Were I any reader other than a Christian one, I'd hit that preachy bit and hurl the book across the room. Preachy bits are boring, and they imply that the reader is wrong, and even as a Christian, I really don't like them.

    What I believe should happen instead is subtle Christian themes--ones you don't see until afterwards, when you go to church or read your Scriptures and start seeing parallels.

    Here's an example.

    In The Legend of the Storm Sneezer, by Kristiana Sfirlea, the climax is characterized by a need for one character to sacrifice themselves to save the rest. The main character, who loves the character in question very much indeed, steps in and offers herself instead, because as a result of events earlier in the story, the process that will be used to save the rest of the characters won't kill her outright. It still could, assuming the earlier processes get reversed, and it's still an excruciatingly painful thing to go through, but out of her love for the character offering himself, she's willing to go through with it anyway. Reading through it the first time, I thought nothing of it besides, Oh, yeah. That makes sense. You go, Rose! Be brave!

    Then I got to the rear endpapers and read the author's biography, and it explicitly stated that she loves Jesus, and it was at that moment that I realized I'd been reading a Christian fantasy novel, and that the climactic scene was a hark back to the Atonement of Jesus Christ. And I say, "Good job, lady!"

    In my opinion, that is the way Christian fantasy ought to work. It should read just like any other fantasy, and yet subtly introduce Christian beliefs to the reader. I don't want to be preached at, but if you do your job right, you can spoon-feed me your opinions and your Christian values, and I won't notice, because it just fits with the story so well. Then I find out you're a Christian author, and I realize how much of a genius you are.

    I also believe that in a lot of ways, Christian fantasy as we know it today doesn't go far enough. "The New Convert's Journey" always shows a fairly average person. Someone who hasn't made a mess of their lives, and whose only fault is that they have not yet been exposed to the truth about the world.

    But in real life, that's not the sort of person Jesus came here for. I mean, He came for everyone, but He even explicitly stated on multiple occasions that he wasn't here for the generally righteous. He came to save the sinners--the people who had messed up their lives and were drowning in sin, and who didn't know how to get out again. As He put it, a healthy person needs no doctor. You don't go to the hospital unless something is wrong with you, and when you go, you go intending to get well again.

    Which means, in essence, that one of the most Christian types of fantasy you can get is the one where you start out with a character who seems unredeemable (if you're a Sanderson fan: Moash). As the story progresses, we get to see the character realizing that they don't like where they're at, and they want to change. But they don't know how.

    The story then shows their journey from sinner to saint, their redemption, the way they go from being a messed-up person to being one of the most righteous people in the book. And by the end of it, you realize that this character was a good person all along--they were just too mired in sin for anybody, including themselves, to see it.

    If you read many of my stories (and I know there aren't any available yet), I think you'll find that themes of redemption and love come back time and time again. This is because I believe that there is no person too far gone to be redeemed, and no person too damaged or flawed to be loved. And I try to represent that in my books. I'm not going to try to tell you God exists and that you should believe in Him. But I'll open up the possibility that no matter what you have done, there is a way out.

    Ultimately, what I'm going for is a kind of... spiritual basketball assist, where I introduce my readership to these ideas and themes of redemption, and then, when missionaries from my church come and talk about these things, the people reading my books have already learned something about it, so it doesn't feel so foreign.

    But I don't want to drive you away by being too zealous. I'll be 100% open about the fact that I am a firm believer in Jesus Christ, but I'm not going to try and force that on you. You are free to choose and believe what you want. I'm just here to introduce some new ideas.

    At some point, I'm going to be writing a story about a character with a thoroughly messed-up life. If you've read The Patchwork Fiddle, it actually stems from this kind of story, one that I dreamed up a few months ago. The main character in that story is a magically-enhanced assassin, who is working for the villain only because he has her son. She must do everything this man tells her to, or else her son dies. To save her son's life, she kills any noblemen who get in her master's way, and she also serves as the man's personal mistress, because, when you're an evil dude enslaving people, you may as well enslave them in every way possible. (The guy's name is Valdemar. I thought it was a nice mix between Vladimir--the name of a guy a long time ago, who liked to put his enemies' heads on sticks in public areas, and who may have been the inspiration for Dracula--and Voldemort. This is good, because this fella is a creep. He actually scares me, and I wrote him!!)

    The main character doesn't know how to get out. She could just leave, or allow herself to be captured, except that if she doesn't come back from a mission in time, her son dies. She can't assassinate the man enslaving her, because he's constantly guarded, and as soon as the alarm goes up, her son dies. If she were to try and kidnap her son to get him out, she'd be facing a castle full of soldiers who have no inhibitions on shooting the kid with an arrow as punishment. In other words, she's totally trapped.

    (What I'm trying to do here, writing-technique-wise, is create a character who does terrible things, but who we sympathize with anyway because she's doing out of motherly love. What good mother wouldn't do whatever it took to save her child? Also, I love impossible situations like this because they make you think. If this were my seminary class, my teacher would be trying to convince me that this character shouldn't be making the decisions she's making, which I concede that she shouldn't; but at the same time, you can understand why she's doing this stuff. And again, it's exactly this kind of person that Jesus came to save.)

    Over at the outside world, the main character's brother is searching for her, along with his best friend, whose sister happens to be her number one target. The Patchwork Fiddle is the result of a planned conversation between the main character and the best friend, when he's trying to tell her that he doesn't care about her messed-up past, and loves her anyway, and will do whatever it takes to get her and her son out of this mess safely.

    We'll see when I actually write this baby. I don't think I've got the skills to pull it off yet, which is why it's hanging out in a Story Fragments file on my flash drive. But if I want to write Christian fantasy, and if I think that this type of story is as Christian as you can get, then this is a story I'm going to need to tell at some point.

    In the meantime, I wish you good luck on your own adventures.