What Makes Christian Fiction Good? (CROSSOVER feat. Nathan James Norman) — SA111

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2 responses to “What Makes Christian Fiction Good? (CROSSOVER feat. Nathan James Norman) — SA111”

1. 

   Eve Franklin

   April 3, 2014

   I really enjoyed all the layers of this discussion. The topic of supporting Christian art while at the same time concern over the bad quality of the majority of Christian-produced material has been a topic very near and dear to my heart for many years. Your point about the percentages based on the actual total amount of any particular product having an affect on the over all perception of the genre is a good one. However, my concern has also been that Christians tend to be overly preachy when they create “Christian” art–what I call “preaching to the choir.” This is a turn off not only to any rare non-Christian who might try to pick it up, but also to Christians who are looking for clean entertainment versus a sermon. It’s the classic authorial intrusion that is usually frowned on in any good story-telling, that seems to be a standard for much of Christian fiction. What I like to see is artists of various talents who happen to be Christian. Instead of creating art for a Christian audience, they create art from a Christian perspective/foundation/worldview for a much broader audience. After all, the pagans and the atheists are not creating art just within their own limited genre, so why should we? If we are striving to perfect our skills and talents for the glory of God, IMHO we should be reaching beyond the choir loft. Unfortunately, I feel that many Christians who would like to publish in the secular markets are stumped by the worldly expectations of their publishers/audiences. I’ve long had a dream to start a publishing company that would publish for secular markets but attempt to obtain work by those excellent Christian authors that usually have to compromise their ethics to get their stuff published in the secular markets.

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2. In God’s Image: Author & Podcaster: Nathan James Norman | 3LC Publishing

   June 13, 2015

   […] James Norman during his appearance on the Strangers and Aliens podcast’s episode entitled, “What Makes Christian Fiction Good?” (also on itunes). Nathan’s thoughts were both articulate and interesting, and I listened to […]

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