Monthly Archives: June 2010

The 2010 Christy Awards: fantasies are winners!

The 2010 Christy Awards were announced over the weekend. I’m proud to say that three of the recipients were reviewed here at the Christian Fantasy Review, all of them part of the Christian Science Fiction/Fantasy Blog Tour. I found all three to be outstanding works.

They are:

SUSPENSE

    Lost Mission by Athol Dickson – Howard Books: a Division of Simon & Schuster

VISIONARY (meaning speculative fiction)

YOUNG ADULT

There were six other categories in the Christy awards, ranging from contemporary romance to historical.

Notice that the winners were in two other categories besides “visionary.” These two books, Dickson’s and Peterson’s, are winners in their “other” genres: suspense and young adult. Way to go, writers! Maybe the heart of the market is softening toward science fiction and fantasy, told from a Christian worldview. I sure hope so.

The Christy Awards are a way for the industry to recognize outstanding fiction sold in the Christian marketplace. They are named for Catherine Marshall’s beloved novel Christy.

Source: Rebecca Luella Miller

Imaginary Jesus by Matt Mikalatos, a review

imaginary
Imaginary Jesus by Matt Mikalatos, a review
Published 2010 by Tyndale House, 225 pages
Genre: Youth group discussion materials for teens

This book is a long, entertaining yarn. The author characterizes it, tongue-in-cheek, in the middle:

“Wouldn’t it be great if someone wrote a sort of semi-autobiographical novel comedy thing instead of a Sunday school lesson for once?” (p. 177)

Matt Mikalatos writes a tale about himself as a seeker, hanging out with Jesus in a coffee shop. But “Pete” (the Apostle Peter) shows up and demonstrates that this is not the real Jesus; he is an imaginary Jesus. Pretty soon we find out that there are lots of imaginary Jesuses, as many as our idolatrous imaginations can cook up. Finding the REAL Jesus becomes Matt’s goal, although he continually sidetracks himself because he enjoys hanging out with his imaginary Jesus–after all, since Matt made him up, he has a lot in common with Matt!

One of my sons, 17 years old, was talking about zoning out in Sunday School recently. The book they are reading is a exegesis of something or other. I bet if they were reading this book, he wouldn’t be zoning out. He would get to discuss his own idols and what his imaginary Jesus might be like.

There’s a story in the yarn, too; Matt starts out a novice Christian, fretting over the problem of evil: why did his unborn child die?

The book is delightfully self-conscious; besides the sentence about “wouldn’t it be nice if,” there’s another about a strange coincidence happening “purely for plot convenience,” or something like that. It’s a lot of fun, full of truth, and peppered with laughter. It’s the perfect thing for my teen son’s Sunday school class.

The book trailer:

This post is part of the Christian Science Fiction/Fantasy (CSFF) Blog Tour. If you’d like to know what others thought of this book, check out their posts:

Brandon Barr
Keanan Brand
Grace Bridges
Beckie Burnham
Valerie Comer
R. L. Copple
Amy Cruson
CSFF Blog Tour
Stacey Dale
D. G. D. Davidson
Jeff Draper
April Erwin
Andrea Graham
Tori Greene
Becky Jesse
Cris Jesse
Jason Joyner
Julie
Carol Keen
Krystine Kercher
Dawn King
Leighton
Rebecca LuElla Miller
John W. Otte
Donita K. Paul
Crista Richey
Chawna Schroeder
Rachel Starr Thomson
Steve Trower
Fred Warren
Phyllis Wheeler
KM Wilsher