Comments on: Shack Attack – and books on the way out?

By: Shack Attack 2 - and the web is where it’s at! « UKCBD: The Christian Bookshops Blog

Wed, 25 Mar 2009 21:20:33 +0000

[...] Top 50 chart and analysis (The Bookseller, pp.14-15) puts it at No. 49 (up from No. 80 last week, top of the Heatseekers chart) with last week’s sales logged by Nielsen BookScan at just over 5,000 copies, total sales [...]

By: Boaly

Boaly — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 15:44:37 +0000

I think i’ll go with Ally Simpson’s statement about the shack. As far as fiction goes its not the best!

I’m also not sure about recommending a book on the basis of it’s critics?

By: joe

joe — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 08:06:46 +0000

Phil – I implicitly agree with your last paragraph, which is why I do not accept a difference between secular and sacred fiction. It is either good or bad, fullstop. If the authors cannot make it in the rigours of the book market, why should anyone read it simply because it is ‘Christian’ – and anyway, I would dispute that things like left-behind are anything to do with the Christian faith?

Non-fiction I would probably look in a different light, although much of the output of Christian non-fiction appears to have much in common with self-help books and little to do with considered Christian practice and theology. There are exceptions of course.

By: Phil Groom

Phil Groom — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 20:19:19 +0000

Melanie: I'm sure you could have got away with recycling the old Alice through the Looking Glass Humpty Dumpty quote: "When I use a word it means exactly what I want it to mean, nothing more and nothing less" ... or you could have claimed a woman's prerogative (ouch! I felt that: OK, OK: I apologise)... Ally: Mark Driscoll. What can I say? My impression is that the man's a misogynist and a control freak. Of course, I could be wrong, but I do know that his ways are not my ways... Joe: to trash all Christian fiction with such a broad stroke strikes me as kinda harsh... are you including CS Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia in that generalisation? What about Paul Kercal's Sylver Chronicles? And a whole raft of other Christian fiction writers? That last link includes a lot of "non-Christian" fiction but I deliberately mix them up: I like to be able to offer Christian perspectives on mainstream literature as well as reviews of the Christian stuff... which I think begs another question: is the distinction between sacred and secular literature a valid one? Surely the whole of life is sacred, not just the bits we choose to label 'Christian'? As the old hymn writer put it, "Seven whole days not one in seven..."

By: Melanie C

Melanie C — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 17:53:26 +0000

Phil,
I think I was thinking of using quantify in terms of ‘logic’ ie limiting the variables of a proposition by prefixing some sort of operator etc in order to ascertain what qualifies as intelligent literature… or some guff like that – so yeah ok how are we qualifying intelligent literature, especially bearing in mind I just proved my inability to be intelligent so am wiped out from the ability to do so anyway!

By: joe

joe — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 12:57:32 +0000

‘Christian’ fiction = rubbish fiction. The speed of flight-from-the-shelves is not related to the quality of the literature.

By: ally simpson

ally simpson — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 08:35:10 +0000

mmm, The Shack is!! I can be very tolerant but in this case i have to say in my humble opinion it is a bit rubbish!

So, Phil? You don’ like Driscoll?

By: Phil Groom

Phil Groom — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 20:48:50 +0000

Should that be "qualifying" 'intelligent literature', Melanie? Though yes, Left Behind certainly did quantify the bad...

By: Melanie C

Melanie C — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 20:20:21 +0000

(Before we start and right here I raise my hands and admit I haven’t yet read any of the articles you cite so I am just going on thought stream here – oh and need to say my natural state of thought is probably similiar to google power browsing, in my family they refer to it as a grasshopper brain jumping all over the place! so here goes).
Ok well that’s interesting but how are we quantifying ‘Intelligent Literature’ exactly – because length does not make it intelligent – war and peace is long but largely unintelligable to me! and that quote about ‘Bad Christian Fiction is barely read’!! well (excuse me for any offense caused in advance!) but was the man absent when all the Left Behind series was whizzing of the shelves in the thousands, now I read those books along with secular same types such as the DaVinci Code, but come on it disproves the statement that Bad Christian Fiction is barely read and upholds that Intelligent Literature is on the way out.
But then again I come back to how do we quantify intelligent or for that matter good!
For me if it makes you think, question and ponder then its probably intelligent, if it makes you read and want to keep on reading then its probably good!