From: kevin_c75@yahoo.com   
      
   On Sunday, August 31, 2014 5:11:23 AM UTC-4, Nicky wrote:   
   > Oh I see. It seems odd to narrow down the genre by outlook the other genres   
   being more define my style. Do people choose only to read left leaning   
   political SF or right wing stuff too? I'm perhaps out of touch but the notion   
   doesn't seem to have made    
   it this side of the pond although C.S. Lewis' work is well known.    
   >    
   > Personally I dislike narrowing the categories of genre - it makes stuff that   
   falls between them harder to sell and seems to represent the imposition of   
   unnecessary restriction on a genre which should allow the most innovation and   
   flexibility. When I    
   started writing it was much easier to write whatever you liked. I don't want   
   to read or write the same thing endlessly but publishers tend to want to stick   
   you in a box along with your work. Perhaps this tendency has gone further in   
   the US?   
      
   No, it's a definite subgenre. Again, think Steampunk, or Cyberpunk, or   
   Slipstream. Let's see . . . the best way to explain it is to read it.   
   Unfortunately, other than C.S. Lewis' SF and F, there aren't many samples of   
   this category. Really, from a UK    
   standpoint, C.S. Lewis is perhaps the best example, not only the Space trilogy   
   or the Narnia series, but _'Till We Have Faces,_ which uses the tale of Cupid   
   and Psyche to make a point about the Christian faith. But perhaps the very   
   best example is Lewis'    
   _The Great Divorce,_ which is clearly Christian and clearly fantasy. At the   
   far extreme Lewis' _The Screwtape Letters_ and _Screwtape Proposes a Toast._   
   Christian [genre] is between _The Great Divorce_ and _Till We Have Faces,_ but   
   is closer to _The    
   Great Divorce._   
      
   Now, in contrast, I think Chesterton's Father Brown mysteries would fall in   
   the category of mainstream mystery, even though the protagonist is a Catholic   
   Priest. That's because the primary focus is on the mystery.   
      
   Let's try this: The three basic plots are man's struggle against nature; man's   
   struggle against man; and man's struggle against himself. Christian lit   
   introduces a third: Man's struggle with God. For an illustration, Ben Bova   
   wrote a story of a lunar    
   rescue, with the events mirroring the protagonist's internal struggle. So here   
   we have an SF story where in the "foreground" is the rescue, but in the   
   "background" is the internal struggle. In Keith Laumer's _Once there was a   
   Giant,_ the struggle in the    
   foreground is man against himself, with the background the struggle of the   
   protagonist and the title character against nature. So, in Christian [genre],   
   the primary struggle in the foreground is Man with God, with the events of the   
   story, like Laumer's    
   in the background.   
      
   This is what makes it a separate genre, moreso than, say, military SF, where   
   the actions forms the framework for an SF yarn. Or Holly Isle's Devil's Point   
   trilogy, or even Niven and Pournelle's _Inferno_ and _Inferno II,_ none of   
   which would be    
   considered Christian Fantasy, for despite the subject and framework, there is   
   no struggle between Man and God.   
      
   > I am just starting to use Scrivener so I may try and learn this as well!   
      
   I'll be interesting to hear how you like Scrivener. I tried it use it, but was   
   too pressed for time to learn it, so used a standard word processor.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)