For Agents

Church of the Epistles can be compared to many meaningful and successful works, including The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd, Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, The Celestine Prophesy by James Redfield, Mitch Albom’s Tuesdays with Morrie, Life of Pi  by by Yann Martel and John Grisham’s A Time to Kill.

Church is separated from Harper Lee’s classic by almost fifty years, and its prejudice is based on religious doctrine rather than race, but its themes of guilt and innocence, good and evil and moral training are timeless. Like Mockingbird the action takes place entirely within a small southern town, and it employs a broad cast of characters of different ages and backgrounds. Where Church differs is in channeling the emotional development of the antagonists and protagonists to offer them the opportunity for redemption.

Like Kidd’s The Secret Life of Bees, Church is set in the rural south and features a teenage girl facing complex issues of isolation and guilt, yet Church offers a unique story  of characters with a myriad of byzantine issues.  And in the vein of Martel’s Pi, Church is a story of survival and faith.

Like The Celestine Prophesy, Church of the Epistles challenges rigid Christian doctrine with a higher-level approach to faith.  However, instead of using New Age philosophy to make the contrast, Church of the Epistles draws its message of love, faith and acceptance from Christ.  And like Grisham’s first novel, Young’s story portrays a town torn apart by divisiveness, and characters justifying horrific actions in the name of justice.

Though set in a church community and portraying characters grappling with faith, Church of the Epistles can be contrasted to fundamentalist mainstream religious fiction.  As one reviewer put it, “Church of the Epistles provides an antidote of hope, love and understanding to the judgment Left Behind by another series of books.” 

Church also shares a practical side with the work of public minded authors such as Mitch Albom, in its message of hope and redemption. Old Sam and to a lesser extent Aunt Jodi, are guiding moral figures in Church comparable to Morrie in Tuesdays with Morrie. But where the antagonist in Morrie is the consumerism, that in Church is prejudice and judgment.