The villain in The Sign of the Sword was inspired by a very colorful nightmare I had once. I was walking through a New Orleans cemetery just before sunset. A big, bald black man in a black turtleneck was chopping at a stump with an Read More …
Author: tdwise@saumag.edu
Sign of the Sword Inspirations: Christ-Figures in Fictional Worlds
When I was writing The Sign of the Sword, it was fashionable for Christian fantasy writers to include fictional Christ-figures in their stories. C.S. Lewis had done it in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe with Aslan, his noble talking lion. This scene still Read More …
Sign of the Sword Threads: C.S. Lewis and Narnia (or Deep Magic)
Today is the 119th anniversary of the birth of C.S. “Jack” Lewis on November 29, 1898. Lewis was a firm believer in the ability of mythical stories to illuminate “true truths” like the ones he discovered when he returned to the Christian Bible after years Read More …
Sign of the Sword Threads: One Wild Hayride
When I was growing up, hayrides were popular among the church youth groups in Louisiana and Arkansas. We usually had them in late autumn when the night air was cool and nightfall came early. Someone would load a flatbed trailer with bales of hay. Read More …
The Sign of the Sword: Seeking Hope Through the Mists of Avalon
For the past six weeks, I’ve been posting about my books and those of friends. I’m almost out of books of my own until I finish some more. This week my posts will be themed around my young adult fantasy novel, The Sign of the Read More …
Tying a Rocket to a Cathedral
Earlier in the week, when I was writing about my non-fiction book, Genesis and the Thoughtful Christian, I wrote about six potential challenges inherent in trying to bring faith and science together. This is the seventh: Challenge #7: Science is dispassionate about results (ideally, Read More …
Happy Thanksgiving from Wisewirx!
Thanksgiving Trivia Question: Did the pilgrims come from England or Holland? (Answer at the end.) If heard different stories about the origins of Thanksgiving over the years. Some accounts emphasize the high mortality rate of the pilgrims. Over half of the 102 colonists had died, Read More …
What Happened on this Day in 1963?
Trivia Question: Which of the following individuals died on November 22, 1963? A. John F. Kennedy, U.S. President B. Aldous Huxley, author of Brave New World and other works C. C.S. Lewis, author of the Chronicles of Narnia and other works D. All of the Read More …
Apples, Oranges, and the Search for Truth
Bills calling for the teaching of creationism in schools have been submitted to the legislatures of over thirty states including Louisiana, Arkansas, Kansas, and (would you believe) California. (Yes, there are Christians in California. There are also liberals in Arkansas. Who knew?) The concerns of Read More …
A Tale of Two Museums
To explain why I wrote Genesis and the Thoughtful Christian, my only nonfiction book so far, let me tell you about two museums I’ve visited. About twenty years ago, I was walking around Nashville when I saw a sign advertising a Biblical Archaeology Museum. (That Read More …