T
o say that a book is a great Christian novel obviously and necessarily implies two things: first, that it is great and, second, that it is Christian. Many of the books here are widely considered to be great, but there seems to be little consciousness that they are also explicitly Christian. Although Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov is widely thought of as a Christian work, as are Flannery O'Connor's stories, Cry, the Beloved Country and Tolstoy's War and Peace— and even Anna Karenina—are almost never referred to in this way. How many literate people are not even aware that Les Miserables and The Count of Monte Cristo are unapologetically Christian? And The Lord of the Rings—how many among the vast multitude of its fans even guess that it is thoroughly and deeply Christian? Here's the list.
Twelve Great Christian Novels by Martin Cothran 22
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy A young engaged couple came to me recently and asked if I would give them marriage counseling. "Absolutely not," I responded. "I'm not qualified. But I'd be glad to meet with you and answer any questions you have." My only condition was that they read this book, which is possibly the greatest Christian novel ever written, and is certainly the best novel on marriage ever written. (There may be some other great book on marriage I have never read, but I simply refuse to believe there is one better than this.) There are several marriages in this book, but two are primary: that of Levin and Kitty, the paradigm of a Christian marriage—a model of marriage—and that of Anna and Vronsky, which is a mockery of marriage. What Levin and Kitty have is love; what Anna and Vronsky have is mutual idolatry. It is Christian marriage and its evil twin. Reading this book might change your life. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy I had a psychological block about even attempting this book because it was, to people of my generation, the quintessential Long Book—even though I had read longer books than this without psychological consequences. But once MemoriaPress.com
