Guest Post and Giveaway: A Draw of Kings (The Staff and the Sword #3) by Patrick W. Carr

Release Date: February 18th, 2014

Description:

Read an excerpt HERE

Their journey to Merakh should have made Errol and his companions heroes of the realm. Instead, much is changed on their return. In the wake of the king’s death, Duke Weir is ruling the country–and his intentions are to marry Adora to bring an heir.

With Errol and the others imprisoned and the identity of the rightful heir to the throne still hidden in secrecy, Illustra is on the verge of civil war–and at growing risk from the armies of Merakh and Morgol.

A dangerous mission to free Errol succeeds, but the dangers facing the kingdom are mounting with every passing moment. The barrier has fallen, ferals are swarming toward the land, and their enemies draw near. Will the revelation of Illustra’s next true king come in time or will all be lost?

GUEST POST

About compatibility: Christian and Fantasy Genre

It’s interesting when I hear this topic debated. Rebecca Luella Miller has an excellent blog where this comes up fairly frequently and the discussions are always lively. For me, it’s never been much of an issue. When Jesus became incarnate and walked among men, he went out of his way to speak in terms of parables, stories really. Why? Because we’d remember them better that way. I use the same tactic when I’m trying to teach math to my students. I use stories to give them something to hang the knowledge on. Hopefully, it makes the concepts easier to remember. 

But as for stories, works of fiction, there’s an important point to be made. All of them are fantasies in that they are the fictional work of an author who has a point to make. The only difference in a fantasy (I actually prefer that word to speculative) is that we must create a more obviously alternative reality. In that sense I think writing a Christian fantasy is at once easier and more difficult. It’s easier because we can be more aggressively allegorical and symbolic than other authors. But it is also more difficult because of the scrutiny the genre attracts. 

This is something I can attest to. A fair number of people didn’t realize that my story was in part an allegory on a misguided mechanistic church, and they took exception to the use of lots to make decisions. They automatically assumed that since I had created that structure in my tale, I must approve of it somehow. Understandable, but in their rush to judgment after a single volume of a trilogy, they rather missed the point. Had they read the trilogy in its entirety, I like to think they would have had a different opinion. 

To be fair, I’ve also been criticized because my Christian fantasy wasn’t edgy enough. There were people who thought I should have been more liberal with my use of language and sex, which just goes to show how different viewpoints can be. But to the main point, is Christianity and Fantasy compatible? Of course it is for the simple reason that EVERY work of fiction is someone’s fantasy. Every work of fiction has the author’s theme littered through the pages and his plot and dialogue are there to convey the message he wants to impart. 

Fantasy allows us as readers and writers to engage our God-given gifts of imagination. I believe He is pleased with our efforts to use those imaginings to glorify Him, even if they fall short of perfection as, inevitably, every human endeavor must.

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About the author:

Patrick Carr was born on an Air Force base in West Germany at the height of the cold war. He has been told this was not his fault. As an Air Force brat, he experienced a change in locale every three years until his father retired to Tennessee. Patrick saw more of the world on his own through a varied and somewhat eclectic education and work history. He graduated from Georgia Tech in 1984 and has worked as a draftsman at a nuclear plant, did design work for the Air Force, worked for a printing company, and consulted as an engineer. Patrick’s day gig for the last five years has been teaching high school math in Nashville, TN.

He currently makes his home in Nashville with his wonderfully patient wife, Mary, and four sons he thinks are amazing: Patrick, Connor, Daniel, and Ethan. Sometime in the future he would like to be a jazz pianist. Patrick thinks writing about himself in the third person is kind of weird.

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