Favorite Christian novels

Lucian Hodoboc · **Posted:** Fri Jan 04, 2019 10:19 am

Do you like Christian fiction? Name some of your favorite novels centered around Christianity or containing Christian themes / motifs. This thread is only about fictional works, so don't mention non-fiction books.

Dorothy B. · **Posted:** Fri Jan 04, 2019 5:02 pm

Lucian:

I very much like to read the novels written by Michael D. O"Brien. The first one I read was "Father Elijah", and then read several more.

He is also an artist as well as a Catholic writer of novels, and designed his book covers.

Other novels of his that I highly prize are: "The Father's Tale", and "Voyage to Alpha Centauri".
Most of his novels are anywhere from 600 to over 1,000 pages. (I don't mind that one bit.)

There are others that I have loaned to grandsons and I can't think of the exact names of them.

That author is capable of writing about deep spiritual mysteries and can convey an awe to the reader.

St. Irenaeus of Lyons · **Posted:** Fri Jan 04, 2019 9:52 pm

Hi Lucian. Welcome to this community.

It's probably been over a decade since I read and greatly enjoyed Willa Cather's Death Comes for the Archbishop. The following is from a product description of the novel on Amazon:

Quote:

Willa Cather's best known novel is an epic--almost mythic--story of a single human life lived simply in the silence of the southwestern desert. In 1851 Father Jean Marie Latour comes to serve as the Apostolic Vicar to New Mexico. What he finds is a vast territory of red hills and tortuous arroyos, American by law but Mexican and Indian in custom and belief. In the almost forty years that follow, Latour spreads his faith in the only way he knows--gently, all the while contending with an unforgiving landscape, derelict and sometimes openly rebellious priests, and his own loneliness. Out of these events, Cather gives us an indelible vision of life unfolding in a place where time itself seems suspended.

GKC · **Joined:** Thu Feb 20, 2003 10:22 pm **Posts:** 19371

St. Irenaeus of Lyons wrote:

Hi Lucian. Welcome to this community.

It's probably been over a decade since I read and greatly enjoyed Willa Cather's Death Comes for the Archbishop. The following is from a product description of the novel on Amazon:

Quote:

Willa Cather's best known novel is an epic--almost mythic--story of a single human life lived simply in the silence of the southwestern desert. In 1851 Father Jean Marie Latour comes to serve as the Apostolic Vicar to New Mexico. What he finds is a vast territory of red hills and tortuous arroyos, American by law but Mexican and Indian in custom and belief. In the almost forty years that follow, Latour spreads his faith in the only way he knows--gently, all the while contending with an unforgiving landscape, derelict and sometimes openly rebellious priests, and his own loneliness. Out of these events, Cather gives us an indelible vision of life unfolding in a place where time itself seems suspended.

Good choice.

Doom · **Posted:** Sat Jan 05, 2019 5:41 pm

I'm not sure I know what a 'Christian novel' is, but I would say, the Narnia series if that qualifies.

Peregrinator · **Posted:** Mon Jan 07, 2019 10:28 am

You might consider C. S. Lewis's "Space Trilogy" - Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength - or Walter Miller's great novel, A Canticle for Leibowitz. Or if you like Charles Williams (some people don't, go figure), War in Heaven.

Doom · **Posted:** Mon Jan 07, 2019 3:28 pm

Peregrinator wrote:

You might consider C. S. Lewis's "Space Trilogy" - Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength - or Walter Miller's great novel, A Canticle for Leibowitz. Or if you like Charles Williams (some people don't, go figure), War in Heaven.

A Canticle for Leibowitz is great, I didn't even think of that one! Often included on lists of 'best science fiction novel ever written', one doesn't have to be Catholic to appreciate it, even CS Lewis, a non-Catholic, was on record as saying it could be a serious candidate for the title.

Arthur C Clarke was a fan of the space trilogy, but I've never cared for it, in general, I've never been all that impressed by Lewis' fiction outside the Narnia series.

GKC · **Joined:** Thu Feb 20, 2003 10:22 pm **Posts:** 19371

Doom wrote:

Peregrinator wrote:

You might consider C. S. Lewis's "Space Trilogy" - Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength - or Walter Miller's great novel, A Canticle for Leibowitz. Or if you like Charles Williams (some people don't, go figure), War in Heaven.

A Canticle for Leibowitz is great, I didn't even think of that one! Often included on lists of 'best science fiction novel ever written', one doesn't have to be Catholic to appreciate it, even CS Lewis, a non-Catholic, was on record as saying it could be a serious candidate for the title.

Arthur C Clarke was a fan of the space trilogy, but I've never cared for it, in general, I've never been all that impressed by Lewis' fiction outside the Narnia series.

Lewis said it was a major work, but said little more about it. He had only read it once, and he planned to read it again.

Lewis liked PERELANDRA best, of his own fiction, until he wrote TILL WE HAVE FACES.

My favorite is THAT HIDEOUS STRENGTH.

For Williams, THE GREATER TRUMPS and PLACE OF THE LION.

Doom · **Posted:** Mon Jan 07, 2019 4:00 pm

GKC wrote:

Lewis said it was a major work, but said little more about it. He had only read it once, and he planned to read it again.

.

He said that but he also said that he thought it might be the best science fiction novel that he ever read. Lewis was also a fan of 'Childhood's End', for a while there, Lewis and Clarke (heh!) had a little mutual admiration society going on

GKC · **Joined:** Thu Feb 20, 2003 10:22 pm **Posts:** 19371

Doom wrote:

GKC wrote:

Lewis said it was a major work, but said little more about it. He had only read it once, and he planned to read it again.

.

He said that but he also said that he thought it might be the best science fiction novel that he ever read. Lewis was also a fan of 'Childhood's End', for a while there, Lewis and Clarke (heh!) had a little mutual admiration society going on

I was citing his comments in the transcribed recording of his discussion with Brian Aldis and Kingsley Amis, published in a couple of places, such as OF OTHER WORLDS ("Unreal Estates"). I thought maybe it was also in a letter, but there is no mention is Hoopers collection.

Where might he have said that, as to possibly being the best SF novel he had ever read?

I got the book on Lewis and Clarke's interactions somewhere, but ICFT.

Peregrinator · **Posted:** Tue Jan 08, 2019 1:45 pm

A Canticle for Leibowitz is one of my favorite sf novels - definitely in the top 3. If I were reading it at the moment I would probably say that it was my favorite, but then the same could be said for The Mote in God's Eye. But I like That Hideous Strength almost as much, even though it is radically different from the other two novels in the Space Trilogy. I have to admit, I am not a huge fan of Perelandra but other people do like it - and like it a lot - so I feel obliged to mention it.

GKC · **Joined:** Thu Feb 20, 2003 10:22 pm **Posts:** 19371

Peregrinator wrote:

A Canticle for Leibowitz is one of my favorite sf novels - definitely in the top 3. If I were reading it at the moment I would probably say that it was my favorite, but then the same could be said for The Mote in God's Eye. But I like That Hideous Strength almost as much, even though it is radically different from the other two novels in the Space Trilogy. I have to admit, I am not a huge fan of Perelandra but other people do like it - and like it a lot - so I feel obliged to mention it.

Basically my position, all around. So much so that I am impelled to send you a PM.

p.falk · **Posted:** Mon Jan 14, 2019 10:48 pm

My top over these years is still AJ Cronin's "Keys of the Kingdom".

Favorite Christian novels

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