In Search of "Clean Reads"

 Librarians have long wrestled with the question of what they should recommend to adults who want to give formative books to the children and adolescents in their lives. We live in a society whose authors love to push the envelope of propriety, so how far can a book go and still be considered a “clean read”?

The question is so important that some bloggers now compile lists of books they consider to be “clean reads.” A few examples are The Fussy Librarian, Compass Book Ratings, Life and Lit, and the Library of Clean Reads.

However, the question is more complex than it first seems. Readers of one generation may consider a book to be “clean,” while the next generation doesn’t. The same is true of readers from various faith traditions.

For example, Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is often cited as the quintessential American novel, yet it has been banned from libraries for various reasons since its publication. The public library of Concord, Massachusetts banned it immediately as “racist, coarse, trashy, inelegant, irreligious, obsolete, inaccurate, and mindless.” Two decades later, during the prim Edwardian era, the New York Public Library removed Huckleberry Finn from its shelves because it used crass terms like “sweat.” Still later, when the civil rights movement was at its height, hundreds of libraries banned the book because it used racial epithets. Although librarians respected Huckleberry Finn as an authentic narrative of a boy's life in antebellum America, many believed it was not a “clean” one.

Some books fall short of being “clean reads” because they contradict the religious convictions of certain groups. A pair of Amish ladies asked their public librarian to recommend a good YA novel on horses that their preteens could read.  She checked the list of recent books and found a novel written by an award-winning author, so she recommended that. The ladies returned it a few days later, quite upset. The premise of the story was that the spirits of championship horses rose from the dead during race season and inspired their descendants to win races again. That wasn't what Amish parents wanted to teach their children!

We Christian authors grapple with this same question. How can we make our stories authentic without offending prospective readers? Can we put profanity in a character’s mouth, regardless of whether that person is a believer? Can our characters drink alcohol, regardless of whether we name it for what it is or use a euphemism like “amber liquid”? Can boys and girls swim together, regardless of how much their swimwear reveals?        

In my next blog, we’ll examine the standards that various Christian authors and publishers use as their benchmarks for a “clean read.” In the meantime, consider sending a sample of your work to websites that recommend "clean reads." They can open doors to libraries as well as individuals.

Joe Allison writes both fiction and nonfiction, and has been a member of the Indiana chapter of American Christian Fiction Writers since 2010. His most recent book is Hard Times (Warner Press: 2019). He lives in Anderson, IN, with his wife Maribeth.

Moral Fiction

In other blog posts I’ve referred to the late John Gardner, long-time professor of creative writing at Oberlin College and elsewhere, who left us several classic books on the art of fiction. His life was cut short by a tragic accident in 1982, yet his books continue to share timeless wisdom. Consider this passage from The Art of Fiction (Vintage: 1985):

The value of great fiction…is not just that it entertains us or distracts us from our troubles, not just that it broadens our knowledge of people and places, but also that it helps us to know what we believe, reinforces those qualities that are noblest within us, leads us to feel uneasy about our faults and limitations (31).

Gardner believed that all great fiction sharpens our moral sense. While he dismissed preachy fiction,  he had a keen eye for the moral purpose of an author. If he found none, he felt the author had lost a great opportunity because “the ultimate value of fiction is its morality.”

It's true: Great novels prod the reader's conscience. Great authors shine the spotlight of accountability on the reader's life. Their stories become an integral part of who the reader is.

So when we embark on the adventure of writing a novel, I believe we need to ask ourselves, “What eternal issues are at stake here? How will my characters be tested by those issues? And how will Christ enable them to come through those tests stronger, more mature, and more like Him?”

Joe Allison writes both fiction and nonfiction, and has been a member of the Indiana chapter of American Christian Fiction Writers since 2010. He lives in Anderson, IN, with his wife Maribeth and daughter Heather.

The Need for Heroes and Heroines

David Brooks’ new book, The Road to Character (Random House: 2015), attempts to understand what motivates people to serve and sacrifice for others. He begins with the Creation stories of Genesis 1 and 2, which describe two different visions of humanity that he calls Adam I and Adam II:

While Adam I wants to conquer the world, Adam II wants to obey a calling to serve the world. While Adam I is creative and savors his own accomplishments, Adam II sometimes renounces worldly success and status for the sake of some sacred purpose. While Adam I asks how things work, Adam II asks why things exist, and what ultimately we are here for. While Adam I wants to venture forth, Adam II wants to return to his roots and savor the warmth of a family meal. While Adam I’s motto is “Success,” Adam II experiences life as a moral drama. His motto is “Charity, love, and redemption” (xii).

Brooks admits that he’s an Adam I personality. A newspaper columnist and political pundit, he is more anxious to look good than to be good. To put it in his own words,

I was born with a natural predisposition toward shallowness…I’m paid to be a narcissistic blow-hard, to volley my opinions, to appear more confident about them than I really am, to appear better and more authoritative than I really am…Like many people these days, I have lived a life of vague moral aspiration—vaguely wanting to be good, vaguely wanting to serve some larger purpose, while lacking a concrete moral vocabulary, a clear understanding of how to live a rich inner life, or even a clearer knowledge of how character is developed and depth is achieved (xiv).

What a striking description of the kind of person who reads our novels! He may seem eminently successful by outward appearances, but inwardly he knows how deficient his life is. He wants a life that really matters, so he looks for moral heroes and heroines.

Make no mistake: The world is desperately wants decent life models. As Christian authors, are called to describe such people. And yes, we are called to be such people.

An Atheist on the Moral Impact of Stories

I'm an avid listener to National Public Radio, so I routinely monitor programs such as "Weekend Edition" on my car radio, even when they feature guests hostile to Christianity. That is how I came to hear Scott Simon's interview of Philip Pullman last Saturday morning.

Pullman (who describes himself as a "religious atheist") wrote the children's trilogy called "His Dark Materials" twenty years ago, beginning with The Golden Compass. He incited the wrath of Christians everywhere with his 2010 book, The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ, a fictional version of Jesus' life. While I'm not recommending Pullman or his books, I want to draw your attention to a couple of his comments from that NPR interview:

Simon:  You’ve suggested that stories are the way to teach morality.  

Pullman:  Well, ... people remember stories better than they remember commands. One of the greatest storytellers of all time, Jesus of Nazareth, told stories in order to make his moral teaching more memorable, more explicit, more clear to everyone.

Simon: Why do you think that is?

Pullman: We like hearing about people in circumstances, situations, or problems that we can relate to in some way. It’s intriguing to see how people resolve the difficulties they’re in, ... inspiring to see them overcoming hostility, difficulty, and outright hatred.

In other words, morality is forged in life conflict. Our sense of right and wrong, good and evil, beauty and ugliness grows out of wrestling with the obstacles that life throws across our way. And that struggle is best portrayed through stories, not pious sermons or philosophical lectures (with all due respect to preachers and philosophers). I agree with Pullman at that point, don't you?

I liked the interview for another reason: It proved that unbelievers care deeply about morality. Eminent atheists of every age, from Aldous Huxley to Christopher Hitchens, have focused on the moral questions of life. Couple that interest with storytelling skill and you have an author who can influence millions of people. Charles Dickens, G.K. Chesterton, and C.S. Lewis are Christian authors who come readily to mind, but atheist authors such as Pullman can wield just as much influence.

Pullman uses his storytelling gift to challenge the values we normally teach our children, such as the importance of telling the truth. He expects to shape the convictions of a new generation by telling them memorable stories.How about you?