You saw me, greeted me with a smile never reaching narrowed eyes, eyes that said, “I know what you think about me.”

“No, you don’t,” I wanted to say. “I don’t know what I’m think about you, so how could you?”

I kept my words to myself instead, returning my own imitation smile.

Barely half my age and already looking out at the world with jaundiced eyes.

Who hurt you? Who told you this is all there is? Who said you can’t change?

So, maybe I do know what I think about you, but it doesn’t make it true.

Maybe you can guess what I’m thinking, but my thoughts don’t create your reality.

I handed you cash, your eyes widened at the sight.

Does the green define you? Does the trade of images of dead men measure the scope of your life?

No, it’s only paper, a symbol of humanity’s estimation of worth. It’s not your worth, but of the products you push.

What is your life apart from this life behind the scanner? Are your eyes the same outside these gray walls?

Do they brighten in the sun as its rays fly across the blue to dance on the grass?

Do they smile when you greet a lover, or cry when you’re parted from them?

Are they always jaded?

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Plug in a sample of your writing, and it spits out the name of a famous author whose style you emulate. When I plugged in the first chapter of my latest novel, Rise of the Sun King, I got this result:

I write like
Oscar Wilde

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

When I entered the first draft in progress of my children’s story, Ethan’s Magic Leaf, I got this:

I write like
Raymond Chandler

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

How about a sample of my sci-fi short story, The Last Silent Place?

I write like
Douglas Adams

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

How about the first two chapters of my first novel, The Swords of Xigara?

I write like
H. G. Wells

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

Best of all, the utility was consistent in its selection of authors. No matter how many times I plugged in the same writing sample, it always spit back the same result.

Who do you write like? Go find out.

As I’ve made the commitment to be more intentional about my writing over the last year, I’ve been learning what does and doesn’t work for me in the writing process. My first completed novel was one I had been working on half-heartedly for nearly ten years. I finally decided about a year ago to buckle down and finish it, spending a month rewriting and re-charting the 60,000 some-odd words I’d already produced, then finishing the first draft in about a month or so.

What was interesting about the process was how I unconsciously chose to approach the manual aspect of writing—good old paper and pencil. I purchased a five-subject spiral notebook, and went to work a few hours each day writing the remaining manuscript by hand, finishing it sometime in early October.

There’s a point to this story, so hang with me. The remainder of October was spent typing the hand-written manuscript into my computer, and though it was the extra step, it really became something of a blessing. During the transcription process, I was able to essentially do the first round of editing, so in the long run the time was not wasted.

When November came around, I was done with the transcription, and NaNoWriMo was under way. I had downloaded the trial version of Scrivener, determined to give it a real run for the money since I could purchase it at half price after winning NaNo. So here I was, suddenly shifting from writing a first draft by hand to writing on my laptop. Granted, I didn’t know if I could keep the minimum pace necessary to complete 50,000 words in 30 days writing my hand, but I suspect in hindsight I would have.

In fact, I now have suspicions I would have well exceeded the word count.

You see, I’ve since completed that NaNo novel, and as I’ve been going back to do a first round of revision, I’m finding I don’t like the voice of the novel as well as my hand-written one. Even after NaNo was over, and the pressure to produce a minimum word count was gone, I continued forging ahead on the laptop. I fell in love with Scrivener and used it daily to complete the first draft.

In the last couple of weeks, I’ve taken up plotting a new novel, and a short story as well. Without thinking about it, I’ve found myself with pencil and paper in hand, writing out the plots and notes to these stories by hand. I’m enjoying the process so much more than when sitting on the couch with my laptop, and I’m finding myself much less easily distracted. The whole experience feels more organic and natural to me, and I know I’m producing a better first draft.

NaNo is approaching, and I’m considering doing it by hand. Since I can enter a word count number of my own without using the official word counter, I’m thinking I can just figure out how many words per hand-written page I average and use that as a guide for my daily goal and word count. Sure, I’ll have to type it all up later, but I think I’ll come out with a much tighter manuscript in the end.

A Writer’s Declaration

I am a writer.

I am a writer because I choose to be, not because someone else tells me I am.

I am a writer because I cannot not write.

I am a writer because I write, not because I have been published (or not).

I am a writer, and no agent, no editor, no rejection will deter me from writing.

I am a writer because I have stories to tell, even if only to myself.

I am a writer, and therefore I will make time to write.

I am a writer, and therefore I will continually hone my craft.

I am a writer, and therefore I will work hard to breathe life into my characters.

I am a writer, and therefore I will enjoy the journey.

I am a writer, and I will not allow obstacles to become insurmountable.

I am a writer, and I will write until I can write no more.

What’s your declaration? What would you add?

Happy writing!

io9.com ran a post wondering “Christian readers demand more science fiction books. Why won’t Christian publishers listen?” The consensus view seems to be that Christians in general really don’t want spec-fic, and so the publishers don’t see enough demand to make pursuing such themes worth their financial while. As referenced by io9, Mike Duran points out the fact that the largest segments of CBA and ABA publishing are romance style novels marketed to Christian women.

I agree with some of the sentiments of both the bloggers and commenters in this situation, pointing out that much of mainline Evangelical Christianity has a phobia about pushing boundaries. As with music, the contemporary book scene remains fairly innocuous, predictable, and safe. Just like churches who have “contemporary music” in their services pat themselves on the back thinking they’ve become edgy, so too are the mainstream Christian publishing houses satisfying themselves with publish fare that would have seemed risqué a decade or more ago, yet causes the average reader to yawn in boredom.

The real edge-walking producers of fiction like Ted Dekker are few and far between. Frank Peretti broke ground nearly 20 years ago, but even he got too weird for the literary palates of most folks. I think those two authors have been successful because their books lean more toward suspense and psychological thrillers and less toward speculative fiction. There’s no denying they have supernatural elements in their stories, but there’s always a chapter verse ability to quote a similar circumstance in the Bible, therefore making the story safe and acceptable.

Like Christian rock, most spec-fic Christian authors are on the fringes of the Christian consciousness, often relegated to an indie status. As Mike Duran pointed out, there’s Christian spec-fic out there, it’s just that most of it is coming from small, independent publishing houses like Marcher Lord Press, or from self-publishing endeavors. The tide seems to be turning a bit, as the Christy Awards have added a new category in the past few years which includes the genre of speculative fiction. I have my questions on why they chose to call the category “Visionary,” but that’s a discussion for another time.

Seeing Jill Williamson’s By Darkness Hid, published by the afore mentioned Marcher Lord Press, as this year’s winner is evidence of the growing acceptance of spec-fic among Christians, and of indie publishing in general. Another winner, in the Young Adult category, is a fantasy style adventure by Andrew Peterson called North! Or Be Eaten. My daughter thoroughly enjoyed the book, as well as the first in the series On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness.

Stephanie P has an interesting post over on revelife where she makes the case that science fiction and Christianity go hand in hand. Dystopian futures, where mankind seems hopeless make great settings for a story in which true believers can offer hope for the future. Think I’m wrong? Remember the frenzy over Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins’ Left Behind series. Whatever your eschatological bent, those books were pure speculative fiction, a view into a dystopian future progressing toward utopia via the supernatural power of the Biblical God. The only difference was the majority of people who bought and read those books really believe such a day is coming, though the particulars may look different than Left Behind’s portrayal.

Let’s not forget the wide acceptance of C.S. Lewis’s Narnia. Widely read and beloved, they stand at the pinnacle of Christian fantasy alongside The Lord of the Rings. Though Tolkien did not try to be allegorical in his epic—indeed he criticized his friend Lewis for doing so with Narnia—there’s no denial his Catholic worldview is shining through on every page. I’ve said it here before, but when people at my church find out I’m a writer and then subsequently find out I’m writing primarily fantasy, they give me strange looks. This is always funny from people I know for a fact have seen Lord of the Rings and the Harry Potter movies, not to mention a fairly large sample of church members who’ve taken their young daughters to see Twilight.

There are those Christians who take a stand against any and all things that have even the slightest hint of magic in them, citing Scriptures against consorting with enchanters, wizards, familiar spirits, and necromancers (most notably Deut. 18:9-14). For those who want to take that road, thinking it better to be strict in their interpretation and application of the Bible, that’s fine. For me, I see a big distinction between consorting with such things in real life, and reading a work of fiction.

Here is where Christian fiction writers can make huge inroads into the core philosophy of spec-fic. In my own works, I very often have what might be classified as wizards, but I always consider the source of their power. Like Tolkien’s Gandalf, the power of those working good comes directly from Erú, the one and only God of the the Middle Earth universe, a clear analog of the God of the Bible. Those who work evil, their powers come from evil. How is this any different than what we read in the Bible? On the surface, the likes of Moses (parting the Red Sea), Elijah (calling fire from heaven), and even Peter (raising the dead) could be called wizards. The reason they’re called prophets and apostles is due to the source of the power, and their calling to be servants of God.

Christian writers can bring the same worldview into their own stories, weaving their plot and structure in such a way to make their worlds no less fantastic than Rowling’s, Edding’s, Jordan’s, or any other fantasy writer you want to name.

To the other spec-fic writers out there who happen to be Christians, write on, there’s a world waiting to read the adventures God has placed in your imagination.

Without further ado, here are the M and N screensavers.