Gatekeeper

That's what I am at work, I'm a gatekeeper. I recommend books, I don't recommend others.

I'm not the buyer, I'm not the owner.

I'm the Assistant Manager in the smallest of all three His Way stores. 

However I've worked for the owner for eight years now and she listens to me somewhat and allows me some leeway in what I put where in the store.

As of today, I'm  stepping into that gatekeeper role and doing something that makes me sad.

I'm gently closing the door gently against Ted Dekker.

Why?

His latest book, Green, begins marrying Christianity and several other religions in ways that I don't like. There is also a matter of bizarre characters and creatures in it and a level of sensuality which is unnecessary.

Before you get all angry and spitting, I'm not the only one that's noticed this.


Now, I read and loved  Thr3e, and I read Blink and loved it, then I back tracked and read Blessed Child  and A Man Called Blessed  which he wrote with Bill Bright.  I loved those too, and gloried in the fact that I had found a writer who could push the envelope and come up with amazing and hard hitting Christian fiction. I didn't like Obsessed but that's because of the subject matter and the violence level. I gave my copy away to a friend who loved it, and got a lot out of it.

I read Black and was confused a little and intrigued by where he was going with the thought he started. I bought Red and started it and began to get a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach.  But, this was new territory and I was going to stick it out.  White came out and I bought it in hard cover for $11.97 the day it released. I was so mad at him by the end of that book that my head hurt.  I sold all three later that year in a yard sale to someone for 5$ for all three.

True Confessions

A finished product is easier to sell than a concept.

A finished story is easier to market than an idea.

Selling other people's books is easier than writing my own.

Some days I don't think I have a story to tell.

Other days it gets lodged in my throat and I feel like I'm going to choke to death on it.

I am very much afraid I'm too much of a coward to finish what I've started.

Other people's opinions of my tale mean more to me than they should

I'm afraid I'm listening too much to everyone else.

If I don't get this thing finished, I think I will die.