Faith 'n Fiction Saturday

My Friend Amy, who brought us Book Blogger Appreciation Week has a new carnival in the works, the Faith 'n Fiction Saturday.

Each week she will post a blogging prompt, which participating bloggers will answer on their own blogs. Then they head back to the original post and sign Mister Linky! This way we can all come to know each other more closely.

Today's Discussion
Anne Rice became quite famous for her books about vampires but when she converted back to her Christian faith, she left her vampire stories behind much to the dismay of her fans. She felt there were no redemptive stories to tell about vampires. Meanwhile, Christian fiction has been releasing a few more books about vampires.

So my question for you today is...what do you think about these kinds of stories? Do you enjoy the fictional vampire stories or the fictional stories about angels? Are you more likely to read a story about an angel than a vampire? What do you think is the appeal of these books?

(For further reading see this interview with Tracey Bateman on Christian vampire books and this article where Anne Rice asserts angels are the new vampires)

My Response:

It's funny this question came up because I just finished my first two Christian vampire stories this week: Thirsty by Tracey Bateman and Field of Blood by Eric Wilson. I don't want to spoil the plots too much b/c I'll be posting reviews later on but I do want to say they were FANTASTIC. The only General Fiction book about vampires that I've read and sorta liked were the Twilight series but those have other issues besides vampires that I have trouble with.

I'm not too big a fan about stories about angels. The only series I REALLY liked with an angel was the Heavenly Daze series by Angela Hunt and Lori Copeland. The series was more like Mitford with guardian angels so it was more comfort reading and didn't really focus on spirituality. I think other than that book I don't really like reading books about angels because they are real and we don't really know anything about them other than they have supernatural powers. It's kind of scary when you think about it. I know that movies like Angels in the Outfield, The Preacher's Wife, or Michael portray angels as being quite human or that people who die become angels. But that's Hollywood talking and the image is quite wrong.

Ok back to the question. I'm more comfortable reading about vampires but only because these are two authors I trust and am already fans of their work. Since I don't really read this genre in general fiction, I would be choosy with new authors in this field. I think the appeal currently stems mainly from the fact that things like Twilight, True Blood, Vampire Diaries, etc are all really popular right now and the Christian publishing world wants to provide an alternative to that. It has the same feel but obviously shows who the bad and good guys are.

By the way, I still think someone needs to write about Amish vampires....you have the best of both worlds right there...