[u]The Novelist[/u], by Angela Hunt
WestBow Press, Division of Thomas Nelson, 2006

An unusual book, but Angela Hunt writes unusual stories. She’s not your typical Christian fiction writer. The Novelist isn’t brand new, published in 2006, but I’d never read the book, and the title and jacket description intrigued me. As a writer, I was too curious not to read it. The story read quickly, over two days, and I’m glad I read it.

This is a plot within a plot I guess you could say. The book’s lead, Jordan Casey, is the highly successful novelist of a blockbuster spy series starring her trademark super hero, Rex Tower. When she takes on the job teaching a writing class at a local college, one of her students challenges her to write something different from her trademark genre, to show more emotion in her writing. He accuses her of creating a plastic lead character in her books who always acts exactly as counted on.

Jordan balks at first to the criticism, both from the insolent student and then from her husband, who feels as a believer she should share some of herself with her audience. She, however, accepts the challenge and begins a new book that she will write over the course of the class to demonstrate the process for her students. There is, though, another, more important, and more personal reason for the new book: She will tell a story unlike anything she’s previously written to help her son, who ultimately presents his mother with the biggest challenge of her life.

As Jordan’s novel takes shape and her characters get into trouble, her own real-life plot is also spiraling downward, leaving her without control. Her world grows dark, and she isn’t sure which life she’s more involved in, the real or the one she’s created on paper. The story takes on a surprise focus towards the end that both delighted and shocked me. I learned some things about writing I hadn’t realized before and a "novel" idea about God that had eluded me after all these years.

I love books that keep me riveted and that also teach me something new. This book definitely did both. For writers and people curious about how best-selling fiction is written, for mothers of young adults gone astray, and for anyone interested in mental illness, this book is well worth your read.