Saturday, 30 May 2009
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City of Black & White
By Mat Kearney
see relatedThankful Thursday (Vol. 85)
Oh Thankful-ness....what a glorious way to end gloomy and self-centered thinking! Get on it today! You won't regret it! This week's edition of Thankful Thursday is HERE!
I'm Thankful for:- Fantasy, Sci-Fi, and other fantastical fiction - Most of you know, I am a ridiculous book worm and am usually in the midst of at least 2 or 3 books at a time. This week, I read the last two books in the Harry Potter series. I forgot how much I enjoyed those books. Sci-Fiction/Fantasy and Historical Fiction tend to be my escape reality. Those are the books that I most enjoy, most find pure enjoyment in. I'm grateful that God has given people the ability and creativity to write so well about places far distance and removed from regular life and allow for pleasure for those of us who enjoy it so much.
- My small group, although I prefer to call them my sisters : The worship team has really been my life saver here in Virginia, and if I'm being honest, the group as a whole has wholly become my family here in Virginia. They walked with me through a pervasive gloom that hung over my spirit and heart since last fall, even though they didn't really even know that it wasn't normal for me. But along the way, especially once things lightened, the girls have just loved me, and there isn't anything more sweet when you aren't even sure where you're supposed to be, and how things are going to work out. The cool thing is, that my positive attitude has returned (for the most part) and the girls recognized it as my true self. They walked with me through Mom's surgery from a thousand miles away better than almost anyone else I know. I have grown to love these girls so much and I'm thankful for the moments when we get to share and roll up our sleeves and get real with each other.
- Circus Peanuts: Silly, I know. But I love them. Something about the cushy, sugary, marshmallow, vanilla sweetness is....oh yum. I think maybe because it makes me remember being a kid, or maybe because it's something that is not very grown up to love, but I love them. Enjoying the little things, ya know?
- The Old Virginia Candle Company outlet - The Old Virginia Candle Company (the place that makes the Wood Wick Candles) is here in Lynchburg, so they sell the cast off products, candles that can't be sold b/c they're "nearly perfect" or "not perfect" for super cheap. I'm talking a huge 20 oz wood wick candle for 6 bucks, and I ain't lying. You just can't beat that, and for someone who loves the candle yummy-ness in her life, it's a good cheap option. Every now and again I'll go and sweep through, spend about 20 bucks and walk out with about six candles, and you just can't beat that.
- Musical Variety - Sometimes, and actually almost all the time, I put my ipod on Song Shuffle and let it rotate through the entire music library instead of using playlists. And let me just say, I so much enjoy that my music will go from Pavarotti to OneRepublic to Metallica to Audra Mcdonald to Over the Rhine to Beyonce to Santana to who knows what else will come up. And I love it all.
- Your turn.....
- Fantasy, Sci-Fi, and other fantastical fiction - Most of you know, I am a ridiculous book worm and am usually in the midst of at least 2 or 3 books at a time. This week, I read the last two books in the Harry Potter series. I forgot how much I enjoyed those books. Sci-Fiction/Fantasy and Historical Fiction tend to be my escape reality. Those are the books that I most enjoy, most find pure enjoyment in. I'm grateful that God has given people the ability and creativity to write so well about places far distance and removed from regular life and allow for pleasure for those of us who enjoy it so much.
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Comments (7)
What sci-fi / fantasy authors do you like / recommend? ~ L
I love fantasy literature as well. I think it is proof positive of our identity as subcreators, glorifying God in acts of creation that reflect a piece of His great work. He has created worlds; we seek to do the same.
I feel bad for Christians who do not revel in the creativity of fantasy worlds. Good fantasy literature is a wonderful way of exploring spiritual principles, played out on a background that shows those principles to best advantage. I don't think it's an accident that the two big grandfathers of modern fantasy, Lewis and Tolkien, were believers
@empress8411 - Ursula K. LeGuin is not to be missed! My fave is "The Left Hand of Darkness" and her Earthsea Cycle - which I've not quite made it all the way through, thanks to budget, but maybe the library has it? She also has lots of collections of short stories, which I know you like.
Juliet Marillier is a good writer and I enjoy her. Daughter of the Forest (Book one of the Sevenwaters Trilogy) is a pretty amazing re-telling of an old Gaelic story.
The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley is possibly my favorite fantasy/sci-fi book ever.
AimeeAnne tells me that Ray Bradbury is pretty fantastic, although I've yet to pick up anything by him.
Of course, Tolkien & Lewis are the big ones, and I <3 the Harry Potter Series...but those are all kinda assumed and token authors.
If you discover anything new, let me know! i've tried a few authors sparodically but often find myself bored or dissapointed, b/c alot of Sci-fi/Fantasy is geared towards males with lots of battles and includes much strategy or geeky technological jargon. I'm really much more interested in story. :D
@wisewoman83 - you make a BRILLIANT point, and I often think that believers that dismiss or crticize the likes of JK Rowling (the HP series) and venerate Tolkien's world are hypocritical at best and have managed to alienate a woman who needs Jesus as much as the next and has the talent that God could use if some Believers would get off their religious high horse and love her instead of smashing the work of her heart.
Not to mention, it's completely illogical to have a love affair with one fantasy series about magic and a completely made up world (narnia, middle earth) and denegrate another (HP)...Magic written about is magic...and when viewed through Christ-lenses, we should be able to filter truth and not have to toss the baby out with the bathwater, so to speak.
Sorry, I just get so fired up about this whole arguement.
@Renaissance_Phoenix - I've read LeGuin's Earthsea series including the short stories. Fantastic! I've never heard of Marillier - I must check her out. I've never read any MZB, although I own and read her entire Sword and Sorceress series, which she edited. Lewis, Tolkin, Rowling - all excellent, lol.
I actually did a paper in school about gender in sci-fi/fantasy media, talking about the evolution of female characters. I hate when authors make the women either butchy warriors, or wimpy dishrags. bleck.
If you need new stuff to read, try these:
Patricia Briggs (Hobb's Bargain, Mercy Thompson Series)
Elizabeth Moon (Deed of Paksenarrion, Herris Serano Trilogy)
John Moore (Bad Prince Charlie, Heroics for Beginners)
Neil Gaiman (Neverwhere, Stardust)
Walter Moers (City of Dreaming Books)
Jim C. Hines (The Stepsister Scheme)
Susan Cooper (The Dark is Rising Series)
Non-Sci-fi/fantasy:
Elizabeth Peters (Victorian Era Murder Mysteries with a Female Eyptolgist as the main character. Very amusing)
Georgette Heyer (Devil's Cub, These Old Shades)
Let me know if you want more specifics regarding type/subject/ plot of these books. :D ~ L
Gosh darn it! I just wrote a HUGE post here and when I hit submit, the Internet fizzed and it has all disappeared into the abyss of the cyberworld. *headdeskbang*
Anyhow, what I was going to say was this: I agree with your comment but with reservations. A couple points:
• Rowling's status as an unbeliever should not preclude her works from healthy criticism. I won't hold back honest criticism in hopes of making a good impression and flattering her to Christ. That's dishonest and I don't think it would ever work anyhow! I agree that many fundamentalists have alienated Rowling unnecessarily, but jumping too readily to her defense makes it sound as if she is exempt from all criticism simply because she is not a believer and we need to be nice to her so that she will accept Christ.
• I understand the idea of a converted Rowling using her talents for the glory of God, but am slightly checked by something Oswald Chambers once wrote. He said (in a highly paraphrased rendition!) that we so often have a tendency to look at a talented unbeliever and say "oh, if only God would claim that soul for His own, what wonders that person could do for the Kingdom!" But why should a person with natural abilities be more valuable to God and Kingdom-work than the shyest, humblest soul that ever lived? It's us who place more value on the talented person. And anything that we accomplish for the Lord is entirely through His grace anyways, and probably doesn't have nearly as much to do with natural abilities as it does spiritual.
• I agree with the illogic of loving Narnia and then condemning the HP world on the grounds of it containing magic. However, the people who condemn HP aren't always so hypocritical. I have read articles by people who believe both Tolkien and Lewis were hellbound for weaving pagan mythology into their stories, and that their fantasy worlds are insidious dangers to the young Christian. It's so sad, on so many different levels...
And some more, because I haven't said enough :
I am partway into Elizabeth Moon's The Deed of Paksenarrion, but it's really not that good so far. The prose is choppy and there are so many politically correct little things, it's highly annoying. And of course the female protagonist is sexually assaulted and gets blamed for it, blah blah blah. It might get better later but I am just not feeling motivated to pick it back up...
I did not like Gaiman's Neverwhere (review here: http://www.librarything.com/work/897386/reviews/36366766). However, I am definitely in the minority!
I've read Moers' The City of Dreaming Books too, and again, wasn't overly impressed (review here: http://www.librarything.com/work/568572/reviews/38139086).
I read Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising sequence as a teen and I confess I had to crush a check in my spirit about them. I always thought later that I was just being morbidly sensitive. When I bought the books and started reading them as an adult, I had to put them down halfway through the second book. I can't put my finger on it, but there is something spiritually dangerous in those books for me. I have Christian friends who enjoy them but I cannot. It's too bad because they are well-written and imaginative stories.
After all this negativity, I'm thrilled to second the recommendation for Georgette Heyer! I have only read Cotillion so far (review here: http://www.librarything.com/work/18596/reviews/44519824), but I am currently listening to Friday's Child on audiobook and absolutely loving it. Jane Austen fans should really look into Heyer's Regency stories. They don't have quite the same depth or social commentary that the Austen canon does, but the humor and characters are fantastic. And listening to them on audiobook has been a wonderful experience. I'm certainly looking into more of her work!