Life...? Of the Christian Family is hard for me to review for several reasons.
First, the work is aimed at a “niche” reader population, conservative fundamentalist Christians. Since I cannot be included in that group, comments on the theological aspects of the writing are necessarily limited and should be taken with a very large grain of salt.
Second, it is never easy to review a book written by an acquaintance since personal interaction makes honest evaluation difficult.
Third, the book suffers from a very serious editing problem. This is apparent on the very first page where four words are misused: “then” for “than,” “picked” for “picket,” “setting” for “sitting” and “talking” for “taking”. This page also contains a sentence fragment as well as several punctuation errors, causing the reader to scramble just to understand the prose.
To complicate matters further the author switches from third person to first person narration and then switches from present to past tense within the same paragraph.
The plot is loosely built around a medical miracle that occurs in a local hospital then deals with the fallout. It details the lives of the fundamentalist Christian minister through whom God worked the miracle, members of his congregation, specifically the Thankful family, as well as with an “outsider,” a young open-minded reporter, who traces the events that follow. The subject material, however, is barely substantial enough to make a short story. Very little seems to happen through the first several chapters.
Unfortunately, none of the characters ever becomes more than one-dimensional. Although they outwardly pray a lot, separately and as a family, I never get the sense that any are more than cardboard stereotypes. There is no reason to believe that the Thankful family does much more than love and respect each other and pray.
Characters also act out of proportion to the situation they are experiencing. Mary Thankful and her family at one point throw what amounts to a hissy fit because Mary’s boyfriend, Bill Selfish, wants to talk with his minister before discussing a personal matter with Mary and her family. Bill’s action seems very reasonable to me but brings on a lot of anxiety in the Thankful family.
The author’s theological positions are difficult to follow and are best left to those more comfortable with literal interpretation of the bible than I. I must, however, point out that the word “Christian” is not owned by fundamentalist protestant denominations. “Faithful” is not a relationship to God exclusive to those groups either.
This is a work not ready for publication. Much basic re-writing is needed just to bring the material to a level where plot and characterization can be fairly evaluated. Nevertheless Mr. Faulkner is to be commended for attempting this project. His effort and persistence are surely more that I am prepared to do, at least at this time.