As a writer and a member of the Mennonite faith, I found the article linked below very interesting.  I don’t read Amish romance novels myself, or even look specifically for books labelled with the genre “Christian fiction.”  If I like the sound of a story, I’ll read it, Christian or not.

I certainly don’t write anything that could be categorized as Christian fiction.  My Street Stories series is dark and gritty and reflects the often harsh and sometimes diabolic nature of humanity.  But as my recent guest post at Morgen Bailey’s Writing Blog shows, I do believe the best fiction reflects reality in some way.  So are writers doing a disservice when we write something that gives a false image?  What do you think?

From:

What’s a Mennonite to do?

The Amish makeover of Christian fiction

Valerie Weaver-Zercher

by Valerie Weaver-Zercher

But as I read Amish novels, and as I interviewed readers and writers and publishers of the books, I couldn’t help but wonder about what is drained from a religious faith when it becomes the epicenter of a commercially successful literature. What aspects of Amish or Anabaptist life are filed down to pleasing size in Amish novels, or perhaps even erased? When one novelist of Amish-themed romances, in describing her workshop “Amish Fiction 101” at the American Christian Fiction Writers’ Conference, wrote that the Amish world “is such a perfect fit for Christian fiction,” I wondered what part of the Anabaptist story she might be missing.

via What’s a Mennonite to do? – The Mennonite