And you knew Lars had a few books ready
All posts by Phil
Were Not the Right Man on Our Side
. . . For still our ancient foe doth seek to work us woe;
His craft and power are great, and, armed with cruel hate,
On earth is not his equal.Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing;
Were not the right Man on our side, the Man of God’s own choosing . . .
Happy Halloween.
The Empty Food of Idols
One of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s early stories is called “The Hollow of the Three Hills,” in which a woman seeks counsel from a witch and receives nothing but bad news. That appears to be the witch’s point, to break the woman’s heart, and that is the reason I believe her revelations to be complete lies. The story doesn’t say the witch is lying, but I see no reason to believe she isn’t. After all, she is in the service of the father of lies.
Deception is my primary filter for viewing occultic things. On the one hand, trusting the stupid words of a horoscope is a great way to hamstring your life. On the other hand, hoping for special advice from a medium or psychic is like trusting your money to Bernie Madoff. Even if what you hear rings true to you, it’s very likely to be a lie.
So it troubled me hear a caller to a radio program about Halloween say that she understood there were witches in her area placing curses on Halloween costumes and she and her church were praying against them this weekend. I suppose prayer against the enemy for any reason is a good thing, but I don’t remember anything in the Bible and I can’t find anything online from trustworthy sources to support the idea that these curses mean anything.
Note the list of occult practices in Deuteronomy 18:9-12 (John Piper has a great sermon on this.)
“When you come into the land that the LORD your God is giving you, you shall not learn to follow the abominable practices of those nations. There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, anyone who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens, or a sorcerer or a charmer or a medium or a necromancer or one who inquires of the dead, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the LORD. And because of these abominations the LORD your God is driving them out before you.
Most of these are ways someone would seek knowledge, and the rest don’t suggest to me the legitimacy of casting spells on objects in order to harm innocent people who use them. Perhaps the “charmer” is someone who places charms on things, but is there any real power behind this? Isn’t this just another deception? I think it is. Moreover, I don’t believe Christians have a reason to fear “cursed” costumes, but the Spirit of the Lord within them is far greater than anything the devil is able to do.
Such curses have no power. They are like the empty food of lifeless idols. And though other methods of the occult are dangerous lies for anyone who trusts them, I believe these curses are worthless.
Ghosts? I Think There's One on Aisle K-L
Ivebeenreadinglately has a curious post on Nate Hawthorne (his friends call him Nate) and a ghost he may or may not have seen in a library. I say may not have seen to mean that I wouldn’t be surprised to learn the great American author made it up. The great librarian Dave Lull manifests in the comments a link to Britannica list of haunted libraries throughout the country. I note that there are no such libraries in Georgia. I also note my disbelief of any of it. (via Books, Inq.)
Questions Not to Ask an Author
- Do ever look at your gorgeous face in the mirror and ask yourself why you stay indoors writing?
- So when you were writing this, did you think about that A.S. Byatt story from a few years ago that’s almost exactly like yours?
- In what font is your new book set?
- So I heard your editor at Harper Collins is a real beast. Any truth to that?
- Did you complete your creative writing course before finishing this novel?
- Do you think you’re all that original?
- So, do you type?
- If you were to write a basic boy-meets-girl story only three boys meet the girl and she has a lot of cute friends and at one point thinks she may lose all of the boys to her friends but when a fourth guy comes in the first guy gets jealous, what would you call it?
Peterson Interview on INSPYs Blog
Andrew Peterson has an author interview with the people for Excellence in Faith-Driven Literature. He talks about not having an agenda as an author and allowing the story to build naturally.
Much Obliged, Jeeves
Bertie Wooster loves his Aunt Dahlia, even though she has an ugly habit of leveraging him into some kind of theft. It would be for a good cause, of course, but if you’ve ever read Wooster’s adventures in the world outside his London flat, you’ll know it won’t go well. In this book, however, he is spared such pressure from his beloved Aunt–who employs the best French chef in a hundred miles (no small benefit). Instead, she wants him to knock on doors for one of his old university friends who is running for the House of Commons. That doesn’t prevent him from being accused of being a theft by the Lord of Sidcup, that Baron of Black Shorts, Roderick Spode.
I have been reading the stories of Wooster and Jeeves in relatively the order of their writing, but this is the first one which referred to events I didn’t remember, despite the familiar characters. And the familiar story too. This one didn’t surprise me a few times, and while it was wonderfully fun, it didn’t have a few zany scenes like others I’ve read.
One thing I love is Wodehouse’s style of having a character comment on something that isn’t described in the text. For instance, Jeeves was telling Bertie how something surprising unfolded, then in the same paragraph without pausing for description, he says, “I wouldn’t jerk the wheel so sharply, sir. It could alarm the other drivers.”
Perhaps, you’d have to be there to get the feel of it.
Much Obliged, Jeeves is not a good place to start reading Wodehouse’s terrific stories about Wooster and Jeeves, but it is a recommended part of the series. I enjoyed it.
Interview with Paris Review's Lorin Stein
Sampsonia Way has a great interview with the new editor of The Paris Review, Lorin Stein. They talk about the many submissions The Paris Review people read and a little about the author interviews the journal is famous for. They actually had an author reject an interview request recently–someone you may have had on the radio.
Book Trailers
Publisher Michael Hyatt talks about book trailers from Thomas Nelson and embeds a few examples.
Rejection and Rights
Reasons writing gets rejected with links to how to avoid it.