Challenging Non-formulaic Christian Fiction
Explore a curated list of non-formulaic Christian fiction books that break the mold—thought-provoking stories with deep faith themes beyond typical tropes.
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Everything That Rises Must Converge
by Flannery O'Connor
Nine stories of the fierceness and struggle of life among white people in the new South.
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The Crying for a Vision
by Walter Wangerin
This epic tale of sacrifice and redemption is the dramatic account of the rise and fall of the Lakota Indians and an absorbing allegorical saga of the Lakota orphan, Waskn-Mani, "Moves Walking."
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Peace Like a River
by Leif Enger
A bag with ten copies of the title that may also include miscellaneous notes, discussion questions, biographical information, and reading lists to assist book group discussion leaders.
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Peder Victorious
by Ole Edvart R?lvaag
Peder Victorious, the sequel to Rölvaag's massive Giants in the Earth, continues the saga of the Norwegian settlers in the Dakotas. Here again, years later, are all the sturdy pioneers of the earlier novel, Rölvaag's "vikings of the prairie"—Per Hansa's Beret and their children, Syvert Tönseten and Kjersti, and Sörine. The great struggle against the land itself has been won. Now there is to be a second struggle, a struggle to adapt, to become Americans. The development of the Spring Creek settlement in these years is manifested in the rebellious growing up of Peder Victorious. Peder is a beautiful and moving novel of youth and youth's self-discovery. It is the story, too, of Beret's pain and dismay at the Americanization of her children, what Rölvaag described as the true tragedy of the immigrants, who made their children part of a world to which they themselves could never belong. Out of the inevitable conflict between the first-generation American and his still Norwegian mother, Rölvaag built a powerful novel of personal growth, guilt, and victory.
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Velma Still Cooks in Leeway
by Vinita Hampton Wright
Velma Brendle, "the town's chief cook and part-time janitor for Jerusalem Baptist Church ... finds herself dealing with nearly all of the town's problems." Includes several recipes.
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Adam Bede
by George Eliot
A hardy young carpenter in 1799, Adam Bede is smitten by the trifling town beauty, Hetty Sorrel, who loves careless Captain Donnithorne. Soon though, their foolish hearts will trap them in a tragic triangle of seduction, murder, and retribution.