Raised in a small town, Teresa Frohock learned to escape to other worlds through the fiction collection of her local library. She eventually moved away from Reidsville and lived in Virginia and South Carolina before returning to North Carolina, where she currently resides with her husband and daughter.
Teresa has long been accused of telling stories, which is a southern colloquialism for lying. Miserere: An Autumn Tale is her debut novel.
...Handling Religion In Novels:
I would like to thank Megan for having me here today and also for giving me the freedom to pick a topic. Generally, when I visit someone’s blog, I try to write a post that will be compatible with my host’s blog, but here at Literary Life, I had an absolute cornucopia of topics to choose from!
So as I was browsing, I found one of Megan’s posts from 2009 that really interested me where she discusses Rachelle Gardner’s submission guidelines. I think Megan’s post was well-written and espoused her beliefs in a very non-confrontational manner, and her tolerance made me comfortable enough to choose this topic.
Now, if you’re not familiar with the premise behind my novel MISERERE: AN AUTUMN TALE yet, it has to do with an alternate dimension called Woerld that stands between earth and hell. Although all the religions of earth are represented in Woerld, my protagonist is Lucian Negru, who is a member of the Citadel, the Christian bastion against the Fallen.
Everyone thought I was crazy for wanting to use Christians, I mean that automatically makes the novel Christian fiction, right?
No.
I did not intentionally set out to make Woerld a mirror of Earth; however, once I reached that point, the first thing I wanted to do was avoid stereotypes. I realized that my own knowledge of Christianity was based on snippets of Biblical text delivered through sermons, the nightly news’ rendition of the latest rapid-politician-psycho-nut-job-child-molesting-priest.
Hmm. Not exactly sterling examples of humanity.
So I looked around at the behavior of people I knew. These Christians were the polar opposite of behavior portrayed on the nightly news. Most of them are moderates and they never tell people about their religion unless point-blank asked. They don’t run around pointing at other people and trying to force others to believe as they do.
Somewhere there was a missing link between these extremes. I had to discover that link if I intended to treat Christianity with the same respect that I would treat any other organized religion from Buddhism to Zoroastrianism.
I found that link through research. I took a college course in an introduction to the Old Testament and read the Bible so I could understand why some books delivered historical information and others doctrinal texts. I read through the textbook about the New Testament. I got my hands on all the books, articles, or treatises I could find from scholarly resources and I found a lot of the things that I thought I knew about Christianity were wrong.
Are you still with me?
If you are, here is what I what I’ve learned about how to write fiction with religious elements (be they actual religions or whether you have created a religion in fantasy):
- Be respectful. Don’t trash entire ethnic or religious groups based on the actions of a few, but dig deep into the core beliefs of a religion and see what it would look like if it was shown at its best. Then when you portray the evil adherents, they become even more loathsome because the reader has a clear contrast between good and evil.
- Not all members of a religious group are evil. This really helped me with characterization and character motivation. Even if you perceive another religion’s practices as perverted, remember that a lot of the members feel like they are doing what is right. My American Literature instructor made the deepest impression on me when he had us read “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” (Jonathan Edwards) and told us that Edwards wrote the sermon out of love and a sincere fear that his congregation would wind up in hell. It completely changed the way I thought about Edwards and the sermon.
- Which brings me to: examine the core meaning behind texts whenever you can. Knowing the intent of a document or passage can greatly change its meaning.
- Don’t rely on Wikipedia as a research aid. It’s a great starting point, but if you’re going to really root out the meaning of faith-based texts (regardless of religion), you need to consult scholarly works or talk to professors. Some colleges will allow you to audit classes so you can go in and listen to the discussions and participate. I was amazed by how little I actually knew about Christianity.
- Don’t proselytize. Represent the religion accurately, but allow your reader to draw their own conclusions.
- Most “holy wars” are actually over money, property, and prestige. Politicians know that no one is going to want to go and die so that the richer members of society can become richer, but religion is a great motivator. People react strongly to having their core beliefs threatened; politicians know this and use it accordingly to manipulate the masses.
- And finally, when writing, stay as objective as possible. It’s so hard when our passions run high on certain matters (religion being one of them), but if your anger drowns your writing or your story, no one will ever see the point you’re trying to make. An attorney once told me that the most reasonable person in the room wins the argument. While this isn’t always true in oral rhetoric, when it comes to writing, the most reasonable person clearly articulates their point and wins the argument.
Okay, that’s all I have on the subject, but I would love to hear some techniques from you about writing on or about religion. How do you incorporate a character’s religious beliefs into your story?
Miserere: An Autumn Tale
(Night Shade Books / July 1, 2011)
Exiled exorcist Lucian Negru deserted his lover in Hell in exchange for saving his sister Catarina's

When Lucian refuses to help his sister, she imprisons and cripples him, but Lucian learns that Rachael, the lover he betrayed and abandoned in Hell, is dying from a demonic possession. Determined to rescue Rachael from the demon he unleashed on her soul, Lucian flees his sister, but Catarina's wrath isn’t so easy to escape. In the end, she will force him once more to choose between losing Rachael or opening the Hell Gates so the Fallen's hordes may overrun Earth, their last obstacle before reaching Heaven's Gates.
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Read the first four chapters of Miserere FREE here.
The next interview in the blog tour will be at with over at Lindsay Smith’s blog where Teresa will be talking about her writing process.
Some really fantastic points here, Teresa. I don't think I'd ever write about religion!
ReplyDeleteKelli
Hey, Kelli!
ReplyDeleteThanks for stopping by. I didn't think I ever would, but I'm much more comfortable with it now. ;-)
These are wonderful tips, Teresa! I never thought my ghost novel would include early 19th century religious superstition when I first started it.
ReplyDeleteHey, Jennifer!
ReplyDeleteI know, it's amazing what the story reveals to us sometimes, and we just have to go with it.
Every time I thought I had researched all I could, some new wrinkle would pop up and I had to hit the books again.
Teresa