I know, I know–our world is being torn down around our ears, so who cares about so trivial a thing as “Christian fiction”?
But if I don’t take a break from current events of the kind that gather around us like spooks encroaching on a child’s bed when he’s having a nightmare, I’ll go bonkers. Besides which, the wicked won’t triumph, as they’re triumphing today, for one second longer than God allows. At the breath of His nostrils they will cease to exist.
So… what about this literary slop that gets packaged as “Christian fiction”?
I do understand that there is a great demand for Christian fiction, a demand that far outstrips the current supply. Publishers publish books to meet the demand, including books that would not otherwise have been published (as in, “You dare to bring that to my desk???” and the editor jumps up and shoots the office boy).
But in trying to meet the demand by publishing books that really don’t make the grade, the publishers only hurt themselves. I saw it happen in the horror market of the 1980s and 90s. The reading public clamored for horror, and there is never all that much good horror written, so they published a lot of dreck and people gave up on horror. The market imploded.
We serve God but poorly if we make “Christian fiction” synonymous with “poorly-written, sappy, crummy fiction that’s a cheap knock-off of the real thing.”
If a Christian builds boats and calls them “Christian boats,” and they’re built so poorly that they always sink, how has God been served?
The Christian fiction market is growing. So far, the quality of Christian fiction has not kept up with it.
I hope Christian publishers take their work seriously.
After all, we have to answer to a Higher Authority.