The Map Begins Here...

The first thing that struck me about “Where The Map Ends” was that I had no idea where to start. So I clicked, and I ended up finding a book list. (This is the one without the pretty pictures, since there are still poor souls – me! – with dial-up. There is one with pretty pictures of the covers which you can find here.)

And wow, what do you know? There are lots of spec fic books written by authors who admit to being Christian. Maybe it’s just me, but I didn’t expect that. Probably because in modern America the thought seems to be that Christianity doesn’t sell.

I suppose combating that is the whole point of this blog tour.

Anyway. Moving on.

I have even read several of these authors. Granted, some I knew were Christian fiction. But others… well, I didn’t know that Madeline L’Engle was writing something that could be considered Christian spec fic. And though I know now, I didn’t know way back when I first read CS Lewis that he was retelling Christian stories in a fantasy setting.

Now, some of these (like the “Left Behind” series) are very definitely Christian books. Others (like Shadowmancer, which I never finished and now think I must try again) didn’t strike me as religious at all. The one question that comes to the forefront of my mind is “what makes a book Christian fiction?” Because there seem to be lots of possible ways for the label to apply, and I’m not sure what counts and what doesn’t.

One thing that I certainly must say is that the books on this page have great art.

Another observation is that lots of the Christian fantasy listed seems to be young adult oriented. Not that this is a bad thing. I love reading good YA novels. It’s just a point of curiosity – do publishers think that kids are more likely to accept a book with morals than adults are? Or are publishers okay with putting out Christian books for kids because we’re supposed to be teaching our kids about good morals, and yet adults are supposed to already have them?

(There could, of course, be nothing to that observation. It could just be me noticing the YA books more than the adult ones. Still an interesting thought, though.)

There is a lot more to the website than just a booklist. And there is no way I will be able to cover it all in just one post.

More to come tomorrow…