Great Christian Fantasy Writers: C.S. Lewis and Beyond

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By Joan Campbell On our final quest to discover the Great Christian Fantasy Writers, we creak open the door of the wardrobe and take a peak into C.S. Lewis’ remarkable books. But we also spin forward through the circle of time to where a modern generation of speculative fiction writers are breaking new ground. Irish-born Lewis—academic, apologist and author—is probably best known for The Chronicles of Narnia series. The first of the seven books (The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe) was published in 1950. Whereas Tolkien’s writing hinted at Christian themes, Lewis combined mythical elements with a rather distinctive …

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Great Christian Fantasy Writers: J.R.R. Tolkien

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  On our gallant quest to uncover the greatest—and most influential—Christian Fantasy Writers, our journey inevitably leads to the forests, dales, and Hobbit holes of Tolkien’s Middle-earth. J.R.R. Tolkien, author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, is considered the father of High Fantasy – fantasy of an epic scale set in alternative worlds.   Tolkien’s creation of Middle-earth The vastness and richness of Tolkien’s world inspires many writers and readers. Tolkien began work on this remarkable world in 1917 in the form of various writings which he referred to as his ‘legendarium’ and which he revised until …

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Don’t Let Them Squash Your Creativity

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By Joseph Bentz With all the roles that many of us have to fill throughout the day—friend, employee, spouse, parent, consumer, and so on—the creative self can be one of the most fragile. Even though for many of us the creative self is deeply embedded and even essential to our sanity, it is also easily crushed. Many forces stand ready to squash the creative self. You no doubt have been struck by these enemies. Even the most successful people are prone to these creativity crushers. To name just one example, there are the naysayers. These are the people who tell …

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Great Christian Fantasy Writers: George MacDonald

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“What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun,” says the writer of Ecclesiastes, somewhat wearily (1:9). As an author I’ve felt a little of that same dejection—after all, who wants their books to be ‘nothing new under the sun’? Yet when I consider it more closely, I feel grateful for the authors who have gone before me, who have inspired me and expanded my imagination with their fantastical worlds, to the point where I now create worlds of my own. My books are unique, of course. Nobody …

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The Races of Star Trek: Vulcans and Klingons

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When Star Trek: The Original Series made its debut on NBC in 1966, it didn’t take long for aliens to make an appearance. Gene Roddenberry’s first attempt at a pilot, “The Cage,” featured telepathic beings that could concoct realistic hallucinations. (Although NBC rejected that pilot, footage from that episode was later incorporated into the two-part story arc, “The Menagerie.”). The first aired Star Trek episode, “The Man Trap,” centered around a shapeshifting alien that drew the salt out of unsuspecting victims. Fifty years, hundreds of TV episodes, and nearly a dozen movies later — to say nothing of the books …

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What is Steampunk?

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What is steampunk? I’ve been asked this question a lot lately since my latest novel, Tainted, released last month. To make it easy, I condensed the definition down to this: steampunk is a fusion of our history (usually Victorian or western) and science fiction/fantasy with advance technology that runs on steam. For example:   London set in an alternate universe where magic exists. A western city with sophisticated technology that runs on steam. A Goth English setting with a character who hunts monsters with high-tech weapons.   What I love about steampunk is the possibilities. Steampunk isn’t just science fiction or …

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Mythological Creatures: Kitsune

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Today’s magical mythological creature is none other than the kitsune. Kitsune is the Japanese word for fox, so it’s not surprising that this mythological creature’s origins are in Japanese folklore. Most of the time, kitsune look like regular foxes, until they reach a hundred years old or so, then they start to grow more tails. They can have as many as nine, and the more tails a kitsune has, the older, wiser, and more powerful it is. They can be quite powerful. Among other things, kitsune can shapeshift into a human form—typically either as an old man or a young …

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The Races of Star Wars: Wookiees and Ewoks

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By Joshua A. Johnston When Star Wars first hit theaters in 1977, audiences were captivated by the exotic species of George Lucas’s galaxy far, far away. To the more casual filmgoer, the differences between the aliens of Star Wars and Gene Roddenberry’s then-decade-old Star Trek might have seemed little more than a difference in makeup budgets. The differences, though, went well beyond that. While Gene Roddenberry had political and cultural ideas in mind with his extraterrestrials, George Lucas had more entrepreneurial motives. Star Wars was about creatures that appealed to a broad age group … and, by the time of …

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Mythological Creatures: Chimeras

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Magical creatures are some of my favorite things, probably because I love animals and creativity, and mythological beasts are the perfect blend of those two things. Speaking of blends, the animal I’ll be introducing you to today is the Chimera. Chimera is from Greek Mythology and is described as having the head and forelegs of a lion, the hind legs of a dragon or goat, and a snake for a tail. Chimera has three heads, the lion head, the snake head, and coming right up from the middle of Chimera’s back is the head of a goat. So sharp teeth …

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