The siren's call

After Galatians 4:8-20

 

You walk through the door

and stood in the light, free,

turning your back on the weak,

worthless beliefs of the world,

free at last. Yet now you turn

back to slavery, back to what

you left behind, back to what

is worthless and destructive.

This is not about adherence

to ceremonies and laws and

incense and requirements. This

is about freedom, breaking free

from slavery. Don’t turn back.

Go forward, into the light.

 

Photograph by Leandro Mazzuquini via Unsplash, Used with permission. 

“A Christmas Shadow” by H.L. Marsay

It’s the Advent season, a few weeks before Christmas. Detective Chief Inspector John Shadow finds himself, rather grumpily, at an Advent worship service at York Minster. He’s with friends and colleagues; his assistant, Detective Sergeant Jimmy Chang, is getting married in a few days to the assistant medical examiner.  

The Minster has a new dean, a woman, which hasn’t set well with some in the York community; the dean’s been receiving hate mail. At the reception following the service, she collapses after drinking some wine; her husband recognizes an allergic reaction to nuts and uses the EpiPen he always keeps nearby. The dean recovers, but DCI Shadow also noticed something off about the wine.

 

The wine itself is something that is personally painful for Shadow. It’s made the family of the girl he loved and lost in a pedestrian traffic fatality decades earlier. Shadow never married; he was never even much interested in relationships at all after the death of his fiancée. He’d left London after her death and moved to York; he still lives in the boat they shared.

 

He and DS Chang investigate where the wine came from – a relatively new shop run by two young men who seem to know little about the wine business. Then a young woman from Slovenia who worked at the shop as a cleaner is found dead, the investigation of watered down or fake wine became a murder inquiry. And this one seems to have ties to organized crime.

 

H L Marsay

A Christmas Shadow is the sixth and, so far, last in the DCI John Shadow series by British author H L Marsay. It has all the elements of its predecessors – an interesting mystery, a DCI who likes his food (he eats out a lot), an overly enthusiastic assistant who often drives Shadow to distraction, and an abundance of suspects. It also has more of the back story on Shadow’s ill-fated romance, with his former fiancee’s younger brother coming to York to help deal with what is happening with his wine. And there’s a hint of a future mystery, with Shadow accepting the brother’s invitation to spend Christmas in Italy with his family.

 

Marsay is the author of six mystery novels in the DCI John Shadow series. Set in York, the characteristic features of each of the stories are a curmudgeonly DCI, his irrepressibly cheerful sergeant, a culinary tour of the city restaurants, café, and pubs (some of which actually exist), and an introduction to York’s colorful history and present. A member of the Crime Writers Association, she lives with her family in the city of York in England. 

 

Related: 

 

A Long Shadow by H L Marsay.

 

A Viking’s Shadow by H L Marsay.

 

A Ghostly Shadow by H L Marsay.

 

A Roman Shadow by H.L. Marsay.

 

A Forgotten Shadow by H L Marsay.

Why Poetry Can Make You a Better Writer

Like most of my generation, I read poetry in English classes in high school. It wasn’t until I was a high school senior that I read poetry that stuck in my head. And it was T.S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” and “Four Quartets.” I read poetry in college as well, but my English literature professor gave brutal tests that put me off poetry for years. 

My professional career eventually led me to corporate speechwriting. I enjoyed the work, the executives I wrote for liked what I did, and I had that sense of “this is what I was meant to do.” It was a good friend, one who wasn’t a speechwriter, who suggested that if I were really serious about it, then I needed to read poetry. He sent me three books – the collected poems of T.S. Eliot, Wallace Stevens, and Dylan Thomas. He told me to read them and others on a regular basis.

 

And I thought, seriously? No speechwriter I knew read poetry regularly. Most then and now would read books about current events, developments in science, politics, and a lot of speeches written by others. But poetry? Really?

To continue reading, please see my post today at the American Christian Fiction Writers blog.

Photograph by Nick Fewings via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Poets and Poems: Catherine Esposito Prescott and “Accidental Garden”

It’s an age-old question – are we here as part of a cosmic or divine plan, or did all of what we call life and existence happen by accident? Or as Catherine Esposito Prescott asks in the title poem of her new collection, “Did we plant a butterfly garden or did monarchs stumble on  / the heirloom tomatoes that needed pollen to transfer from pistol to stamen?”  

Perhaps because, as she writes, she was “raised in a religion with many answers,” Prescott doesn’t come to a conclusive answer to the question. But she explores it in a wide array of ways in the 42 poems of Accidental Garden.

 

The title itself suggests the question. A garden, any garden, is planned; otherwise, it would be wildness. “Garden” suggests design and stewardship. But can such a creation happen by accident?

To continue reading, please see my post today at Tweetspeak Poetry.

“Reform: The Church at the Birth of Protestantism” by Luke H. Davis

Luke H. Davis began his published writing career with a series of three mysteries, featuring Cameron Ballack, a county police detective who investigates and solve crimes from his wheelchair. He then published a fantasy book entitled Joël , which was followed by a book on Christian ethics, Tough Issues, True Hope. 

His most recent project has been a series on church history aimed at younger readers (roughly 10-14). In 2022, he published two in the series, Redemption: The Church in Ancient Times and Reign: The Church in the Middle Ages. And now come the next two entries in the series: Reform: The Church at the Birth of Protestantism and Renewal: The Church That Expands Outward.

 

You don’t have to be the targeted age group to enjoy Reform: The Church at the Birth of Protestantism. Each primary chapter focuses on a person, telling a fictionalized account of a specific event in the person’s life. A summary paragraph at the end of the chapter provides a brief biographical overview. And then periodic “fact files” provide a deeper look into a specific topic associated with the overall subject of the book.

 

You can see what Davis is doing here: tell an interesting story about people, provide some factual and biographical information, and inspire the reader to pursue their interest in the subject or person. It works. I thought I knew a lot about the Reformation period. And I was familiar with the major players, like Martin Luther, John Calvin, Ulrich Zwingli, and John Cranmer (I’ve seen the monument to Cranmer’s and others’ martyrdom in Oxford several times). I didn’t know the Reformation roles played by Marguerite of Navarre, Catherine Parr (Henry VIII’s last wife), and Lady Jane Grey. And I’d never heard of Martin Bucer and Patrick Hamilton.

 

Luke H. Davis

What I learned is that, yes, there were major movers in the Reformation, but many people played significant roles. And Davis keeps his accounts interesting by making the historical figures come to life as real and recognizable people. 

 

Davis teaches at Westminster Christian Academy in St. Louis and chairs the Bible Department there. He’s also taught at schools in Louisiana, Florida, and Virginia. He describes himself as “Presbyterian body, Lutheran heart, Anglican blood, Orthodox spirit,” all of which have served him well in writing the Cameron Ballack mysteries. He has published three Ballack mysteries, Litany of Secrets (2013), The Broken Cross (2015), and A Shattered Peace (2017), and the first book of a new series, Joel: The Merivalkan Chronicles Book 1 (2017). He blogs at For Grace and Kingdom.

 

If your children are familiar with church history and the Reformation, Reform is a good place to start. And if you think you know all about the period and the people, Reform might well help you realize that you don’t know as much as you think. 

 

Next Week: Renewal: The Church That Expands Outward.

 

Related:

 

My review of Redemption: The Church in Ancient Times.

 

My review of Reign: The Church in the Middle Ages.

 

Reading a Novel that Stars Your Hometown.

 

My review of Litany of Secrets.

 

My review of The Broken Cross.

 

My review of A Shattered Peace.

 

My review of Tough Issues, True Hope by Luke Davis.

When the time is full

After Galatians 4:1-7 

When the time is full

comes a child.

When the time is full,

comes a man.

When the time is full,

comes a death.

When the time is full,

comes redemption.

With redemption

comes adoption.

With adoption

comes inheritance.

With inheritance

come the indwelling

of the spirit

into our hearts.

 

Photograph by Jose Ortiz via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Saturday Good Reads - May 13, 2023

Like tens of millions of others, my wife and I watched the coronation service for King Charles III. Well, we watched the taped version; we both decided that getting up at 3:30 or 4 a.m. to watch it live was a bit much, even for the new king. I was surprised at how close to the traditional ceremony Charles adhered, and I was surprised at how religious a ceremony it was. Christopher Hatton at The Critic Magazine agrees apparently; he found the service deeply religious.  

It’s a 100-year-old book that is still in print. In 1923, a Princeton Seminary professor named J. Gresham Machen published Christianity and Liberalism. The book had, and continues to have, an enormous effect on Protestantism in the United States. Some of the major debates of the 20^th century – fundamentalism, decline of the mainline churches, and millennial theology – were shaped by Machen’s book. D.G. Hart at Ad Fontes Journal discusses what Machen talked about, and what he didn’t. 

 

Louise Penny has done it in one of her Inspector Gamache novels. Ayn Rand did it. Margaret Atwood has done it. Writers across numerous genres have done it. And that is to write manifesto fiction, perhaps loosely described as building a novel or story around your political beliefs. Nathan Bransford warns against it.

 

More Good Reads

 

News Media

 

‘Manufactured’ Media Lies Can End Democracy: Tucker Carlson Makes First In-Person Speech After Departing from Fox – Gary Bai at The Epoch Times.

 

Ukraine

 

The Ukraine Offensives Are Coming: What Might Success and Failure Look Like? – Mick Ryan at Futura Doctrina.

 

The quiet resistance of ordinary Russians against Putin – Mark Galeotti at The Spectator.

 

Kherson — the city that never sleeps: The daily Ukrainian struggle to survive – Rosemary Jenkinson at The Critic Magazine.

 

British Stuff

 

The Signs of Old London – Spitalfields Life. 

 

The fairytale of British republicanism – Fred Skulthorp at The Critic Magazine.

 

Inventive Vents (Part One) – Andrew Everlin at Photos, photographers, and photobooks.

 

Poetry

 

Bare Branches in Spring – Kathryn Butler at Story Warren.

 

Poet, What Dreamer Thou Art – Cheryl Corey at Society of Classical Poets.

 

Charles Reznikoff: The Finest Noir Poet You’ve Never Heard Of – Nick Kolakowski at CrimeReads.

 

Sole unquiet thing – Ernest Hilbert at New Criterion.

 

Faith

 

How to Read Wisdom Literature – Max Rogland at Ligonier.

 

Jesus stands for Stephen: a sermon on a reading from Acts 7 – Dan King at Bibledude.

 

Where Does Mark End? Handling Snakes and Ancient Manuscripts – Peter Orr at Desiring God.

 

Writing and Literature

 

Susie Luo: On Dreaming About Our Characters – Robert Lee Brewer at Writers Digest.

 

The Power of the Unsaid: John N. Maclean on Ernest Hemingway’s 'Big Two-Hearted River’ – at Literary Hub.

 

Life and Culture

 

The New House, The New Life – Anthony Esolen at Front Porch Republic.

 

'Cultural Christianity' is fading and that reality is linked to some other newsy trends – Ryan Burge at Get Religion.

 

American Stuff

 

Don’t Let Me Come Home a Stranger – Chris Mackowski at Emerging Civil War.

 

On That Day – City Alight

 Painting: Annunciation of Mary, oil on canvas by Lorenzo Costa (1460-1535).