My favourite pet I’d like to have is a cat (and I have one. Well, a cat moved in with us ten years ago and allows us to feed her and pet her and pay her vet bills. I would never imply ownership. Dogs have owners; cats have staff).

But my favourite fictional pet is one I would never have in real life.

I live in New Zealand, a country with exactly zero snakes. We don’t have any native snakes, and we don’t allow any snakes to be imported (probably because the Kiwi, our national bird, is flightless and Kiwi eggs make a great snack for snakes and other pests).

So it’s perhaps a little surprising to me that my favourite fictional pets are both snakes.

In fairness, the first “pet” isn’t so much a pet as an unwanted houseguest, the kind it’s impossible to get rid of. One of the characters in Back to Resolution by Rose Dee has a snake living in the eves of their bush house. The snake does a good job at protecting the property from unwanted visitors, so it gets to stay.

The second is snake is the title character in Belinda Blake and the Snake in the Grass, the first book in Heather Day Gilbert’s Exotic Pet Sitter Mystery series. Belinda’s first job is pet-sitting Rasputin, a ball python … who has nothing to do with the dead body she finds in her flowerbed.

It’s an enjoyable cozy mystery, and one I’m happy to read rather than experience.

Can you think of any novels with pets? What’s your favourite fictional pet, and why?

This is an excellent question, and my answer relates back to my answers for the last two questions:

• Yes, I do think the hero and heroine in a Christian romance novel need to be Christians.
• Yes, I do like Christian fiction with a strong Christian message, as long as it doesn’t cross the line into being preachy.

If I’m reading a novel where a Christian and a nonChristian are heading into a romantic relationship, then I want the nonChristian character to become a Christian before the relationship is established.

And I want to see that decision on the page.

I want to know what events and thought processes have led that character to change their minds, and I want to see it. God celebrates when someone becomes a Christian (Luke 15), so we should too. If the character’s conversion is a throwaway line in the middle of an action scene or before a kiss, then I’m less likely to believe it.

But I also don’t want the conversion scene to be preachy.

I want it to feel true to life and real for that character, and in line with their personality as shown in the novel.

Yes, some people become Christians after though an altar call at church after listening to a hellfire and brimstone sermon. If that’s what happens to your character, great, but we don’t need to read the entire sermon.

Many people are led to Jesus through the still small voice that speaks to them and their specific background and spiritual need.

Characters are the same … or should be.

Yes, I want to see conversion scenes if the hero or heroine isn’t already a Christian.

Yes, I want to see that scene on the page.

But the scene needs to be specific to that character, not something generic.

That way, it’s more likely to feel real and authentic, and it’s less likely to come across as preachy.

What about you? What’s your view on conversion scenes in Christian fiction?

Do the hero and heroine in a Christian romance both have to be Christians?

At the beginning of the novel? No.

By the end of the novel? Yes.

The Bible warns us against being equally yoked, and advises us that a threefold cord (man, woman, and God) is not easily broken. I take that advice to heart in life and in fiction. Just as I would counsel a friend against marrying an unbeliever, I wouldn’t like to see a fictional character make that mistake… unless it’s women’s fiction and the whole point of the book is to show the problems that come with marrying an unbeliever (but then it’s not a romance, is it?)

I have known people who have married unbelievers.

One was married with three children by the time we met. She was a strong Christian and was raising her children in the church, but she said it was difficult … especially when it came to tithing. She wanted to be able to contribute financially to the church, but her unbelieving husband (the family breadwinner) had a different view.

Another was a strong Christian who started dating an unbeliever who became a Christian while they were dating and before they married (or so they told us). We lost touch (due to living in different countries), but recently met up with them again. They are no longer Christians and aren’t raising their children in church.

So while I expect the hero and heroine to both be Christians by the end of the book, I actually prefer it if they are both Christians at the beginning. I’m always a little sceptical about the longevity of a relationship where one person is a new believer, as I can see it causing problems later in the relationship after the last page … and while some romance readers don’t mind the “happy for now” ending, I want to read “happily ever after”.

What about you? Do you think the hero and heroine in a Christian romance both have to be Christians?

I don’t always remember character names.

I’m more likely to remember the novel or their character than their actual name. As such, I don’t necessarily have any names I can think of as particular favourites.

But I can think of two, for different reasons:

In The Prayer Box by Lisa Wingate, the narrator rents a house from Iola Anne Poole. Unfortunately, the first scene shows the narrator finding ninety-one-yar-old Mrs Poole’s body lying on her bed, as though she’d laid down for a nap and didn’t wake up. For obvious reasons, I like that name 🙂

Another name I remember is Paul Ingatius Greatorex from the After the Fire series by English author John Lockley, written in the 1990s. The novels are set in England, and tell the story of a group of misfits brought together after they are some of the few survivors of a global pandemic that kills more than 99% of the world’s population in under a week. Paul’s name stuck with me because of the initials – PIG, which he used to get teased about at school – and because I once saw a book review for After the Fire written by a Paul Ingatius Greatorex, who read the book when he realised he had the same name as one of the main characters.

Those are the only two characters I can think of by name (nothing like being put on the spot to have all the books and character names escape my memory).

What about you? What are your favourite fictional character names, and why?