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The Great Divorce, by C.S. Lewis
Written by Bill Wortman
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Fiction
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 This quick read was the most popular book at our student retreat this Summer. Like all of Lewis’ fiction, The Great Divorce is a colorful and moving story. It is a narrative analysis of what lies behind people’s refusal or acceptance of the Gift of Heaven. For dramatic and theological effect, their choice is imagined as being made in the emerald green meadows that lie at the foot of the heavenly mountains, to which they will be led if only they choose to stay. As you might imagine, the narrative is triumphantly joyous at times, but more frequently heart-wrenchingly sad as various people refuse to stay.
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Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
Written by Larry Taunton
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Fiction
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 My children are reading William Golding's Lord of the Flies for school and, wanting to discuss it with them, I decided to reread it since my own recollections of it were vague, consisting of pigs' heads, barbarous boys, and tribal rituals. My rereading was richly rewarded. Golding's message is a powerful one, stated succinctly on the closing page of the book: " ... Ralph wept for the end of innocence [and for] the darkness of man's heart ..." Golding sees a devil residing in each one of us. That resonates with Scripture. Jeremiah 17:9 reads: "The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked."
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Till We Have Faces, by C.S. Lewis
Written by Larry Taunton
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Fiction
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 Till We Have Faces is the C.S. Lewis classic in which he retells the ancient myth of Cupid and Psyche. I read the book after being compelled to do so by my three boys, all of whom loved it.
The book is not typical C.S. Lewis fare. Lewis's fiction usually contains obvious Christian symbols and parallels: Aslan = Christ, Witch = Satan, and so on. J.R.R. Tolkien, by contrast, believed in a kind of natural theology, that is, if one writes as a Christian, he doesn't need to put deliberate Christian markers into the story because his Christian worldview will come to the surface naturally. To that extent, Till We Have Faces seems much more like the work of Tolkien than Lewis.
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