It’s time for the Christian Science Fiction and Fantasy Tour again. This month we’re focusing on, Fearless, the second installment of Robin Parrish’s trilogy.
I’ve been a little inundated with reading lately, taking in the latest book from She Who Must Not Be Named and an even better book, Spin. So my review is limited to a style analysis based on excerpts I’ve read. You can read them too at ChristianBook.com, a site that nearly always offers several pages to help you decide whether to buy a book or not.
Read the first few pages of Relentless and you’ll see that Robin Parrish has a solid driving narrative style. It relies heavily on short paragraphs and nearly constant dialogue–whether an interior dialogue as in the beginning of Relentless or explicit external dialogue as in the beginning of Fearless. (Just click on “excerpt” to read the samples.)
The primary criticisms I’ve read of the trilogy suggest that Parrish’s driving style is a little more powerful than the story he tells. In short, like so many authors of “page turners” from Crichton to Koontz, his books make more promises than they can adequately deliver.
Understand, that is not my assessment of the books. Merely my summary of the assessments I’ve read.
In addition to Robin’s books, you might want to check out his blog and Infuze, the webzine he helps edit. (And congrats on the coming kid, Robin!)
All of that to remind people about Christian Science Fiction and Fantasy in general. That is the purpose of the CSFF tour. Not so much to review the books or even endorse them, but to raise awareness of the growing trend in publishing to think about Christian spirituality through the genre of speculative fiction. The traditionally Christian publishers are beginning to catch on. The main stream media is taking notice–as evidenced by Wayne Batson’s interview on Fox and Friends. And sales seem to be increasing.
For whatever reason, we are living in an age that wants fantasy. You can credit Potter. Or New Line’s Tolkein. Or Walden Media’s Narnia.
Or you can consider all of those success stories to be evidence that our culture wants fantasy. We need hear good fantasy right now.
Why? We can discuss that in the comment section. Or take a look at the other folks on the CSFF Blog Tour for some answers:
Trish Anderson
Brandon Barr
Wayne Thomas Batson
Jim Black
Justin Boyer
Grace Bridges
Amy Browning
Jackie Castle
Valerie Comer
Karri Compton
Frank Creed
Lisa Cromwell
Gene Curtis
D. G. D. Davidson
Merrie Destefano
Jeff Draper
April Erwin
Linda Gilmore
Beth Goddard
Marcus Goodyear
Andrea Graham
Russell Griffith
Jill Hart
Katie Hart
Sherrie Hibbs
Christopher Hopper
Jason Joyner
Karen
Dawn King
Tina Kulesa
Lost Genre Guild
Rachel Marks
Rebecca LuElla Miller
Eve Nielsen
John W. Otte
John Ottinger
Robin Parrish
Lyn Perry
Rachelle
Cheryl Russel
Hanna Sandvig
Chawna Schroeder
Mirtika Schultz
James Somers
Steve Trower
Speculative Faith
Jason Waguespac
Daniel I. Weaver
{ 5 comments }
Marcus,
Hey, I’m going to ask a favor. Check out my Monday post for tour about heroes and comment on it. I would appreciate your thoughts on that in light of what you posted here.
Good stuff – thanks!
Jason
Mark,
I did feel like the story was going so fast (or was that my reading), that I had a hard time keeping up. But then I blame it on not reading Relentless first.
Jason, good thoughts about heroes over on your blog. I enjoyed reading them!
Eve, pacing is such a tricky thing. Writers want us to feel breathless–especially in a suspense thriller–but we shouldn’t feel like we can’t keep up. I suspect a lot of the difficulty comes from having started with the second book rather than the first.
Thanks for dropping by Bloggin’ Outloud. Appreciate your analysis/summary. Becky, the tour host, mentions something similar about Robin’s style of writing. Since I haven’t read his books yet I just went to our local library and checked out Relentless. I’ll have to read it and see for myself! lol
Have a great week. Lyn
Mark,
I like this review. Even without reading, you’ve provided a great way of encouraging readers to give this a try. I know how crazy the summer can make reading schedules, but this is a great way of sharing something even without a complete read.
As for ACFW conference, sadly no. My wife is due in September and I’ve got a nursery to put together. I already took a week to go to Creation East so I’m going to have to skip this year. I would love to be there, though.
Comments on this entry are closed.