Frank Peretti Books

[BrotherJosh]

Who used to read them?? After de-converting and reading a multitude of other good fiction writers I finally returned to some good ole' Frank Peretti... I tried reading "The Oath" and "The Visitation" again. Honestly, they have a somewhat interesting premise but the whole overarching narrative dribbles down into some simplistic evangelical message along with some really shitty writing (I'm an English major). I thought The Visitation could have been a good book if written without a xtian motive. What would a "Jesus" figure look like today? However, most of his views towards "spiritual warfare", evolution and anything other than his simplistic view of xtianity are laughable. What does everyone else think? Literary criticism notwithstanding, what do former xtians think of his work? He's highly respected in the religious circles I know. It was just interesting to return to his body of work that I so venerated as a young xtian.

[Carmen]

Hear, hear! In my early teens, I read Frank Peretti's "Hangman's Curse" and loved it. Looking back on it, it was basically an evangelizing tool thinly disguised as a teen mystery. Later on I read This Present Darkness and The Oath, but I couldn't really get into them. They just seemed rather insincere, like he was trying to push his message rather than tell a good story. By that time, though, I was starting to become disillusioned with most Christian books and music.

 

My friends still talk about his books all the time. Ted Dekker is another popular author I always hear talked about in Christian circles.

[ClaraOlive]

I thought that Piercing the Darkness and This Present Darkness were decent enough if taken as pure fantasy, although I never read them as an adult. I thought that The Oath was ridiculous proselytizing bullshit - while it was possible to view the war between the angels and the demons as fantasy creatures, that was impossible with The Oath and the obnoxious shallow boring characters.

 

I liked the children's books as a child.

 

I also liked the Thoene's WWII historical fictions. Sadly, they and Peretti are the best Christian popular fiction that I've read. Which tells you how bad the other stuff was.

[OpheliaGinger]

Hear, hear! In my early teens, I read Frank Peretti's "Hangman's Curse" and loved it. Looking back on it, it was basically an evangelizing tool thinly disguised as a teen mystery.

 

They made that into a movie. It's basically centered around an occultist goth who, end the end, is saved by Christianity.

[Girl of Spirit]

LOL, oh bless you these notes are funny sometimes. Yes, I can fully empathise, I re-read The Prophet as an ex-Christian (the one about abortion) and I remember loving it as a vehemently pro-life Christian. When I re-read it as a vehemently pro-choice ex-Christian, I couldn't stop rolling my eyes. At the end when he finally gets to give his news broadcast about the "scandalous" presidential secret, I was glad no one was listening. I was frustrated at his portrayal of giant coat hanger-wielding feminists and the protagonist's judgemental nature. (Having been both pro-life and pro-choice in my lifetime, I fully appreciate both sides of the debate, this is just my own personal contribution to the discussion.)

 

I wish I remember more of my "second impressions," but I do know what you mean. Thanks for sharing

[Midnight-mindwanderings]

I read This Present Darkness and the sequel (or is it a prequel??) to it (forget the name but it is similar) and The Oath. I was a teen so I was on my way out. I thought they were ridiculous if taken seriously/ literally but thought they made good use of the fantasy of Christianity. I was a bit offended by the depiction of new agers/ mediations/ higher self as all demonic though. My grandma gave me these books and she takes that stuff very very seriously. She flipped out completely once because my health teacher led a class hypnosis once and was yelling that hypnosis is demonic possession. Since I was experimenting with meditations I actually thought it would be pretty cool if I met a demon that way but reality is so much less interesting than they think it is. The Oath was interesting but I thought it was messed up how the lady he slept with was killed and presumably went to hell while he got away scott free. Skanky ho diserved it I guess . I haven't reread them but I bet it would be really annoying.

 

On a similar 'stupid christian books for kids' note- who has heard of the Elise Dinsmore books? Here is an apt review on Amazon.com: And yes I did grow up reading these and they get even worse. I actually did try to emulate the main character in these books and it did quite a bit of damage.

This is quite possibly the WORST children's book ever written. Why?

 

1) The heroine is saccharine sweet and endlessly willing to let everyone in her family trample all over her. In fact, she seems to take some martyr-like glee in accepting every kind of scorn and injustice her family heaps on her with nary a complaint. Yeah, way to be a role model for today's girls, Elsie - unless you think the proper social role for women is a sacrificial victim for...

 

2) ...emotionally and physically abusive men. Yes, that would be her crazy father. The one who insists that his every irrational demand be met instantly and who also doesn't see the value in showing any love whatsoever towards his (incredibly needy) daughter. This relationship plays out like a bad Lifetime movie. He's the King of the Castle, and isn't content to just let Elsie crucify herself in every chapter - he wants to tell her what kind of hammer to drive the nails in with. My bet: poor, sweet Elsie grows up and finds another domineering tyrant to marry (undoubtably a man chosen carefully for her by her father), which will allow her to be suitably emotionally abused the rest of her life. And let's not forget the subtle eroticism between father and daughter (and other male friends of the family). It was very creepy in places. I found myself wondering several times while reading this book if he was going to start sexually abusing her when she got into her teenage years. And that's not the right thing to be thinking about when you're reading a children's book. Ick, ick, ick.

 

3) Her disgusting, spoiled, racist, classist, sexist family. In one of the very first chapters, we find Elsie's sweet "Mammie" discussing how even though she's not white, she still can get to heaven. Well, isn't that nice. But do you suppose Jesus will make her come in through the servant's entrance? And every single one of her relatives is dreadfully spoiled and treats her abominably in every chapter (lucky for Elsie-Please-Make-Me-A-Martyr). Really, not suitable in any way for modern sensiblities. I wouldn't let my daughter read this book just because of the racism alone. Yes, it was written in 1850 something. But that's no excuse.

 

4) The over-the-top Christianity. Half this book is a religious tract. I found myself skipping entire pages just to try to find the plot again amidst the saccharine preaching.

 

5) Meekly accepting evil or injust behavior from others is NOT a good thing. That's another message I would never want my daughter to learn. Regardless of one's religious beliefs, the right thing to do in this world is to stand up for what one believes in, and stand up against injustice and unrighteousness, whether those acts are perpetuated against you or others. Frankly, the only admirable thing Elsie ever did in this book was to stand firm in her religious convictions against the disapproval of her family (falling off the piano stool and all that). On Sundays she was a heroine worthy of emulation. Too bad she was a meek little abused mouse the other 6 days of the week.

 

One more note to all the people who gave this book glowing reviews: You people are scary. Call me a sinner, or whatever you want, but I know in my heart of hearts (as a Christian myself, believe it or not), that the message this book sends about the relationship between young girls and men isn't right. I certainly hope you aren't raising your daughters this way or we're all in trouble.

[BrotherJosh]

Oh yea, almost forgot about the Cooper kids books...Tomb of Anak and all that. I only read the Darkness books once and thought they were somewhat decent fantasy but not really great when depicting New Agers...That makes me wonder where Peretti and most xtians get their ideas for this stuff. Since many of you mention your family thinking stuff like that happens or is happening where they get that from? I have family just like that who believe angels and demons are constantly fighting, that demons are everywhere and whatnot. As a young kid I'd read these and actually think shit like that was going down all the time!

 

At Midnight - Wow, I have never heard of those books! Truly horrific stuff from what I've seen, it's weird parents will provide reading to kids like that, and yet denounce Harry Potter...On a side-note I burst out laughing when I typed in Elise Dinsmore on Amazon and a purple vibrator popped up as a related item.

[OpheliaGinger]

How about the Left Behind series for teens? My parents got me those books because they were into the Left Behind series (more like novellas because they are so sort) and I didn't even bother to read them--when I was in a public jr. high school, they implemented a horrendous program that pretty much forced kids to read every damn second of their lives, so I didn't wiggle free of that loathing for books that was fostered by the program until I was at least in college. They have almost every book but I think they stopped reading them after a certain point--probably because they were getting too ridiculous.

[Carmen]

The Elise Dinsmore books were AWFUL! I cannot believe I read and enjoyed them when I was a kid. I think I still have all of the books on my bookshelves upstairs right now. *shudder* It's disgusting how it portrays being a doormat as a good thing. Then again, that's no surprise since the fundies preach that all the time.

 

Last night my sister and I were actually just discussing that scene where she falls off the piano and bonks her head. We had a good laugh over it. A good laugh is about all those books are good for.

[BrotherJosh]

The Left Behind series in general is just awful...especially in light of some of the comments by LaHaye who trots out every single Fundy viewpoint he can. The entire series is a xtian masturbatory desire for the end of the world and for them gays, atheists, Muslims, liberals and Catholics to get their eternal comeuppance.

[Midnight-mindwanderings]

I think the Elsie Dinsmore books are funny now, but its a bit hard to laugh when I took them so seriously as a kid. I read the first left behind book at my grandparents once and it was hilariously badly written. Worse than twilight. The movie is also hilariously awful.

 

All terrible christian movies and books I've seen and read are because of my grandparents. Thus I am censoring what my kids get from them. For bad christian movies: the Love Comes Softly series. I think its a book series too. They are so terrible and boring as shit. I used to watch them to torture my husband. Christian Prairie Romance novels. Hells yeah.

 

If I was a Christian and wanted to give my kids Christianish books, I would stick to the Chronicles of Narnia and Anne of Green Gables. I still love both of those series.

[Redeye_Reprisal]

Oddly enough, even as a Christian, I never really got into the whole "christian fiction" genre

[Overcame Faith]

I read This Present Darkness and Piercing the Darkness in my Christian days. At that time, I liked the novels. I haven't read anything of his in years, but I don't think I would like them today unless I just took them for some sort of fantasy novel - and looking at them that way, they aren't that good, frankly.

[★ Citsonga ★]

Oddly enough, even as a Christian, I never really got into the whole "christian fiction" genre

 

Same here. I didn't read much christian fiction (at least not the stuff that's labeled "fiction;" I read plenty christian stuff that was technically fiction, though).

 

That being said, I did read "This Present Darkness," but I wasn't overly impressed with it.

[Darklady]

I am now and have always been a avid reader, i tried a lot of christian authors as a christian, including Frank Peretti. He was the best of a bloody awful bunch, which isn't saying much. Some books were so bad I hardly got through the first page. I gave up on christian authors pretty quickly and even when a christian I was at a complete loss why anyone would read some of that crap, and that wasn't just because of the content, the writing was usually shocking bad.

[♦ Fuego ♦]

I remember reading "This Present Darkness" when it first came out. I liked some of the imagery of the plaid-shirt angels appearing at the edge of town, and such. And at the time, it seemed to fit in exactly with all the "spiritual warfare" stuff that the church was thrilling to. Now - meh. I don't take in anything that promotes the lies. Ok, I did take in the indy movie "Ink" which is a subtly evangelistic film, but it was pretty well done.

[LastKing]

I admit I did read a big chunk of This Present Darkness but never really got around to finishing it. Looking back on now feeling twaords it are rather negative. To the books credit it some intersting ideas. As a work of Fiction the idea battle tween heaven and hell could for some good entertaiment.

 

Now I will admit I was being sent to Christian them Counsling at the time that really belived in spertual warfar. I still suffer from negative effects of it and call a very sick forum of mind control. I think the only real reason why I would recomend it to anyone is to showe them what really right winged christian actully belive how the world works. At the time I did try get into the books but even then there kept me from finishing it. For Example I did not the heros of the story. Even back jump to the conclusion that he was attack by demons a little to soon. Plus I hated how censored him self in the book. Like intead just simply writing fuck he wrote ________. I dont why but that annyoed me back them. Finaly the thing that make me really not big fan of the book is how new agers are betrayed as devil worshipers.

[SageHealer]

This is my first time actually contributing to a discussion, but the Frank Peretti subject is just too rich to ignore. I read the first book in the series years ago, while still somewhat Xtian, albeit a doubting one. My family raved about these books and how it changed the way they prayed. One thing Peretti did do right was to portray angels as being different races. A pretty progressive idea, but why no female angels?! ( Except one minor angel whoacts like a secretary to the others.)

 

The book is also full of female characters alleging sexual abuse portrayed as liars. Except for one character- a minister's wife who's portrayed as telling the truth. However, the rapist wasn't really at fault. He was simply possessed by a demon named Rape.

 

Tried reading the next book in the series, but it opens up with a husband being accused (falsely, of course) of sexually abusing kids.

 

I know there are actual instances of people being falsely accused, and maybe Peretti has had this issue touch his family, but to portray all women and children as liars seems very scary to me.

[Galien]

I loved the Left Behind books. The Peretti crap was just that. The whole demons are to blame for everything annoyed the crap out of me. I'm too raw a person to believe in airy fairy rubbish.

[Spike Spiegel]

I remember reading "Left Behind: The Kids" when I was in elementary and middle school...I think that, at that time, I wasn't really connecting what was going on in the books with what was "supposed" to happen in a few years. After I realized that the Rapture was "really" going to come to pass, it was the beginning of my long descent into fear of hell and being left behind (I remember that I thought the Rapture happened anytime I lost my mom in a big grocery store).

 

When I was deconverting at the end of my high school years, I tried reading the first book again. Wasn't as thought-provoking and awesome as I remember. One detail that sticks out in my mind is the conversion of the one goth chick and how she starts wearing dresses like a good little fundy girl...all of those kind of things jump out at me now as blatant propaganda.

 

The only Peretti books I ever bothered to finish were "This Present Darkness" and "The Visitation." I watched the movie version of "The Visitation" just because Edward Furlong (John Connor in "T2") played the demon-possessed guy.

[HRDWarrior]

I read a number of his books as a christian, and at the time really enjoyed the "This Present Darkness" series, but I was also a huge fan of sci-fi and fiction, and these were about the only approved books that even came close that I was allowed to read in the open (of course, I read a lot of books without permission, too ). At the time I liked them, but I would have been maybe 8th, 9th? grade at the time, so not exactly a literary critic other than the fact that I enjoyed reading.

 

It may be interesting to pick one up again, but there's other things I'd rather read first, and a lot of video games I'd rather finish first, so I doubt I'll be getting around to it anytime soon....