How to not sound so preachy in Christian fiction?
I’m interested in writing Christian fiction for teens. What would be the best way to get Christian ideals across to the reader without sounding so preachy?
- Chad K
Tags: Christian Fiction, Christian Ideals, Christian Teens, Writing Fiction
April 9th, 2009 at 5:35 pm
just don’t do the usual “bad things happen, girl/boy falls away from god, gets mixed up in the wrong crowd, finally comes back to christ and everything is perfect.” Make it real, make it where God doesn’t really make your life into some big happily ever after marathon, he just makes the person better, not necessarily the circumstances. Teens want truth, the dirty, gritty, ugly parts too. So just make it real, and don’t try to over spiritualize everything and you should be fine.
April 11th, 2009 at 2:32 pm
Don’t talk about God or religion in general in the story. Christians do more than walk around talking about “what would Jesus do” all day. Let the story be about NORMAL people who just happen to be religious and apply their beliefs to how they live their life.
April 14th, 2009 at 8:17 am
one idea is not telling the reader, but showing them. Don’t state your intentions bluntly and thoughtlessly (which will repel the reader), but by expressing it throughout the entire book through ideas. Make the book about something interesting that anyone can relate to, that has nothing directly to do with religion or god, and make the religious part more of a general theme that is taken in more subtly over the whole read.
April 14th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
Don’t have Christianity be the answer to every problem, and don’t have all Christians as nice people and all non-Christians as not so nice people (some of whom become nice when they are converted to Christianity).
Just have it be an important and positive part of your character’s life.
April 17th, 2009 at 3:52 am
You should try to exemplify Christian ideals in characters without mentioning God and Christianity on every page. Also, have some characters that are still good, morally sound people who aren’t Christian because it comes across as very preachy when it is only Christian people that are complex characters.