Fires of the Faithful by Naomi Kritzer

[omly]

I just finished a fantasy novel that made me think about queenofhalves in contrast to her work thinking about matriarchal fantasy. The author, Naomi Kritzer, is relatively new (and was unknown to me until quite recently) having published a small handful of novels. Fires of the Faithful is the first of her series.

One of the most interesting aspects of this book were the two rival religions. The first was the "Old Ways", which are a slightly more gender-balanced variation of Christian beliefs (with the holy spirit, God and her son Gesu. This group has been persecuted by a dualist religion, which worships the Lord and Lady (and encourages the use of magic unlike the Old Ways).

One of the things the I found fascinating was that unlike many novels that use fantasy as a way to discuss more matriarchal or dualist religions in a more positive light, this novel has them as the aggressor and persecutor of the more Christian-like religion.

Comments

[queenofhalves]

thanks for alerting me to this. :>

[ex-evanesce878.livejournal.com]

That sounds.. Interesting. I'm interested in any kind of look at religion, especially in a fantasy context.

(and see. I do read these things :) )

[omly.livejournal.com]

It is available if you are interested in it.