Title	Author	Rating	Times Read
Heaven's War	Harris, Micah & Gaydos, Michael	7	1
I took a Spring Session class on "Witchcraft and the Occult" at the University of Alberta. For our written assignment, we were given the option to do a Critical Book Review of a piece involving the supernatural. I chose Heaven's War, and asked Micah some more questions to help with the paper. Since there was a pretty strong response to the initial interview, I thought I'd post these questions and answers as well. GOTTHAMMER: Heaven's War is certainly not a stereotypical look at occult or Christian concepts for that matter. Have you found that other Christians are uncomfortable with what appears to be a "comfortability" with occult concepts?  MICAH HARRIS: Thanks for the comment that "Heaven's War" broke away from the stereotypical view of Christian concepts. That's what I was hoping for, something largely alien to the usual imagery. Not that I was suggesting what I necessarily think the Kingdom of the Air is really like, but I wanted, primarily, to convey a sense of strangeness and otherworldliness, even eerieness. And, as C.S. Lewis noted, and followed this idea through with his chronicles of Narnia as well as his "Ransom" space trilogy, Christian imagery that has become overly familiar no longer carries the power of evocation it was meant to or once did.     To that end, a lot of my Kingdom of the Air iconography was inspired by extra-Christian sources such as the "room" at the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey, and the recursive "red rooms" of David Lynch's Twin Peaks. And, of course, that type of strangeness was perfectly in line with Charles Williams' off beat creative vision, which was Christian but odd in relation to traditional Christian concepts. So, yeah, as you noted, my goal was indeed "to allow Williams to inhabit the secondary world he himself created."    As for other Christians being uncomfortable with the occult elements of "Heaven's War . . ." I haven't heard from any! I'm assuming that people who would choke on that are not the kind of Christians who are actually going to pick up the book to start with. GOTTHAMMER: "Heaven's War" seems to be a synthesis of religious and magical points of view - the Inklings are obviously Christians, but the cosmology of the story assumes that while God is God in His heaven, there are certain magical correspondences that still work. This prompts several questions: do you see the universe as having magical correspondences, even though as a Christian you would still believe in the sovereignty of God, or were you just allowing Williams to inhabit the secondary world of his novels to some extent? MICAH: I don't think the book promotes any kind of harmony between the Biblically Christian cosmology and occult or "magical" elements also in Heaven's War. Note that the "occult elements" the references to use of, in this case, "sex magick" combined with astrology (the pattern of the planet Venus etched over the Rennes-le-Chateau landscape) -- are not presented as being effectual as a means of conjuring. Consider this: we are told, in the text of Heaven's War, that both Father Sauniere and Aleister Crowley have performed these sex astrological rites, but if you look at it, these actions ultimately served no "magical" purpose. There would have been physical gratification, and, for Sauniere, something of a "show" to impress his clients, but none of that effort opened the portal to the Kingdom of the Air. It made not one whit of difference. After all, Williams passes through the extra-dimensional portal without going through Crowley or Sauniere's "exercise" in magic. Of course, that brings us to the "sacred geometry" of Solomon's inner temple creating the portal into the heavenly realms. Please don't think I'm endorsing Feng Shui. The Scriptures only indicate that the literal presence of God was in the most holy place of the temple, not that there was a doorway opened up to heaven by its geometric cube shape. But I took imaginative license there, to say, okay, heaven met earth in that spot, in a manner of speaking, so what if it would become a translation point? So "magic," I don't think, is particularly operating in the universe of "Heaven's War," though God and the supernatural are. It's interesting that you bring this up. I'm currently writing a mini-series I hope to pitch called "Strange Passages," which I'm plotting with the artist, Loston Wallace, and one of the characters that we've worked up in that is closer to a "Christian mystic," certainly more so than Williams or any of the other Inklings in "Heaven's War". This character is only referred to by his title as "the Duke," which is homage to Dennis Wheatley's Duc De Richleau character of his occult novels. However, I hesitate to say that OUR Duke is a "mystic" of any kind, including "Christian" (in contrast to Wheatley's character, as portrayed by Christopher Lee in "The Devil Rides Out" -- aka "The Devil's Bride" -- whom our character is NOT. He has his own back story as part of a medieval monastic warrior order of sorts which I'm not aware has any parallel with Wheatley's character). I'm really not comfortable with the actual practice of "Christian Mysticism" -- calling up angels for protection, for example, seems like blending Christianity with New Age ideas -- and one thing I was keen on was that the Duke in "Strange Passages" NOT be casting spells and mystic bolts of energy or force, like Dr. Strange or even exhibiting the kind of powers a Jedi knight might employ. You can say he has his "talismans" in "Strange Passages," but it's more like what an exorcist would employ, not a wizard. And by the way -- I don't condemn the Harry Potter stuff, or there being good witches in The Wizard of Oz books. I don't think they're promoting devil worship. They're fantasy, in their own secondary worlds, and of course there is plenty of "magic" in Tolkien and Lewis, good and bad. Although, I DID read an interesting essay contrasting the concepts of "power" in The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter universes. GOTTHAMMER: Do you actually believe in the supernatural? MICHAH: Yes, I do believe in the reality of the supernatural. I've experienced the numinous -- an awareness of the presence of God -- at certain times in my life, and there was no doubt while that was happening about whom I was sensing. It was apparent. Also, my brother was healed divinely of an incurable, fatal kidney disease, what was then known as "Bright's Disease". And -- my father was a minister -- there have been other manifestations of God in my family. My mom is NOT a fanatical fundamentalist, the kind Hollywood likes to make representative of Christianity as a whole; she is, in fact, very sensible, and embarrassed when Christian people act "unseemly" -- she would NEVER endorse "snake handlin'" for instance. And she tells me that once, during one of my father's revival services, during the altar service; she witnessed a ball of fire fly in through the church window and scatter over the altar. Now, I think my mom's response to that adds to her credence as a witness. She thought, "I didn't see that." And THEN -- it happened again! Others witnessed it as well. Some sinners in the back of the church who weren't praying got up and left. So, yes, I do believe in the supernatural. GOTTHAMMER: Do you see the supernatural as primarily religious or magical? MICAH: I might need you to clarify the terms there for me. "Religion" to me indicates ritual and practice and can be completely devoid of the supernatural (Paul spoke of people having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof) and magic, to my thinking, is an attempt to harness the supernatural, not the supernatural itself. GOTTHAMMER: What do you do when you're not writing comics? Or are you a full time writer? MICAH: I'm not a full-time writer. I teach lit, composition, and film at a community college in North Carolina. But I am writing a lot, I still have plenty of time for that. And lately, with the "Strange Passages" project I mentioned above, I have been focusing on writing for comics. However, I am currently shaping up a prose novel and I have an agent to represent it.     Buy Heaven's War at Amazon!

Book Reviews - Heaven's War:

Another interview with Michah Harris

 

Legend
10	This is on either my fiction or non-fiction "top 10 books" list.
9	Will definitely read again and recommend to everyone! Probably kept me up all night.
8	An excellent book that either changed my thinking or was difficult to put down.
7	A page turner or thought provoker.
6	Worth reading.
5	Better than average within it's genre.
4	Typical of it's genre: no surprises.
3	Creative writing assignment that somehow got published.
2	Will rot your brain.
1	Kept reading because I was locked in a cage with it.
0	Piece of crap.
UF	unfinished