Part of the series “My Year In…”
Afghan American novelist Khaled Hosseini writes that “fiction is the act of weaving a series of lies to arrive at a greater truth”. Here’s some truths I gleaned as I ventured into the world of fiction this year, enjoying stories from pages both yellowed and freshly printed.
1. The Wind in The Willows (Kenneth Grahame)
An easy, light-hearted read with some depressing similarities to Ecclesiastes. Toad vainly searches for satisfaction under the sun: first sailing, then houseboats, carriages, and motor vehicles. As the Water Rat explains: “It’s all the same, whatever he takes up; he gets tired of it, and starts on something fresh” (25).
If you’re still struggling with chasing stuff for satisfaction, then I hope one of your friends sitting on you and shouting loudly will be sufficient to wake you up. Otherwise you might have to go through the whole ordeal of imprisonment, disguising yourself as a washerwoman, jumping off a train, and taking your house back from armed stoats and weasels.
Better, as Ecclesiastes says to “Fear God and keep his commandments” (Eccl 12:13).
2. Everything Sad Is Untrue (Daniel Nayeri)
Like few other books I’ve encountered, Everything Sad is Untrue is written for the reader. No, really. That invisible fourth wall is knocked down. When you read about Nayeri’s experiences as an Iranian refugee, you’re addressed directly. Just like this.
It’s a memoir where you realise there are stories and lives you treat as made-up, simply because they are sketched with coloured pencils you never owned. As if your pencils are the only pencils and everyone who holds up a picture with different colours to yours is a liar.
It’s a memoir that transports you into the mind of an Iranian refugee and you realise you’re not sure if that girl is making fun of you or being kind because you’ve never been taught the unspoken rules every other student lives and dies by.
A mind where you blame yourself for your dad staying in Iran and believe if you had just executed that jump properly everything would have been different (even though the Komiteh was threatening to execute your mum, which meant you fled the country).
Over and over, this mind reminds you that your mum is the strongest person you know (she’s unstoppable). Because your mum lost everything to follow Jesus.
3. The School (Brendan James Murray)
In The School, Murray weaves students and stories from more than a decade of teaching into a single calendar year. The result is an auto-fictional account that captures the joys and complexities of secondary school teaching in Australia.
Grace is ineligible for funding yet can barely read or write basic sentences. Claire is a Literature student whose brilliance won’t be reflected under the constraints and pressures of her final exam. Mya is less worried about her final scores and more concerned that if she performs badly, it’ll affect her peers’ results.
Meanwhile, Tessa is being bullied but Lonnie claims innocence. Wambui comes from a traumatic background. Kelvin’s year 8 is upended by the return of stage 4 cancer.
Murray cares for and teaches these students. Hundreds of them. He is buoyed by signs of growth and positive interactions, but recognises his influence is small and the obstacles great. His teaching is admirable, and his writing poses significant challenges to teachers and the educational system. Murray often links the deep pain his student experience to systemic societal issues, appearing to view students as blank slates, coloured and filled in by their worlds.
I thought about teacher friends who would empathise with Murray, and I wished more Australian teachers knew the gospel. That they knew the spiritual reality of sin and suffering and the hope of redemption and restoration. That they knew the picture painted by Jesus is both far more bleak and far more beautiful.
4. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (J. K. Rowling)
Harry Potter provides a Picasso-esque reminder of God’s sovereignty. In The Order of the Phoenix, Harry’s ever-dependable, seemingly indomitable headmaster Dumbledore is absent. With intermingled despair and burning anger, Harry’s heart’s cry appears to be, “Dumbledore, Dumbledore, why have you forsaken me?”
Though we discover Dumbledore is flawed, we also learn he did not abandon Harry. Rather than being indifferent to Harry’s pain and confusion, Dumbledore had been masterfully authoring strands of an unfolding story. A story that depended on its author’s distance to succeed. In love he had been quietly, powerfully working.
Harry did not know Dumbledore’s future plan was to die and leave the burden of responsibility on Harry’s shoulders alone. He only understood this later; thankfully he managed to succeed on his own.
But our Headmaster calls us his friends (Jn 15:15). Even as we wrestle with unanswered questions, express doubts about his goodness, and pray “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Ps 22:1), we already know and can trust our God’s overarching plan. He does not require us to bear a burden he has not carried, nor does his plan finally rest on any action we perform. His plan centres on his own death and resurrection, and the mission he gives us is accompanied with a thousand unbreakable promises. He will strengthen and uphold us (Isa 41:10). He will not leave us nor forsake us (Heb 13:6). He will carry us home (Phil 1:6).
