At the B&N Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog Ceridwen Christensen tagged
ten novels that detail religious missions to the stars, including:
The Book of Strange New Things, by Michel Faber
Pastor Peter Leigh leaves behind a dying earth and his wife Beatrice to minister to the aliens of a planet called Oasis. Oasis is administered (“we do not use the word ‘colony’”) by a sketchy corporation called USIC (the exact basis for the acronym is unknown). A part of the novel is epistolary: the conversation across the void between husband and wife, as they try to maintain a connection in their disconnected places. The Oasans are extremely receptive to Peter’s ministry—they were the ones who requested a missionary; nonetheless, Oasis begins to wear on Peter, both its wonder and its strangeness. The Oasans never quite respond to his theology as expected; meanwhile, Beatrice is being tested in her own way in the once familiar strangeness of earth seen from space. The novel’s title is what the aliens call the bible, and provides is a way toward understanding the events that unfold.
Read about
another entry on the list.
--Marshal Zeringue
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