Matthew T. Dickerson

I really enjoyed this book. I heard Dickerson at a recent conference and picked up his book. I'm a huge Tolkien fan and enjoyed Dickerson's themes. Morality is central to Tolkien's works, and Dickerson really showed that to be true, through references to LoTR, the Hobbit, the Silmarillion and Tolkien's letters. I really liked his exploration of Gandalf's character. He explored the religious themes in the trilogy, without getting too allegorical, and proves that taking the moral high road is show more central to the lead good characters. show less

The authors evaluate every book in here from a Christian point of view. Thus they judge Le Guin's work as morally ambivalent, instead of just noting she tends to be Taoist. They applaud C.S. Lewis and Tolkien because their work is more in line with the authors' own beliefs. They aren't necessarily prejudiced against other religions, the author's show open mindedness, but the point of the book seems more to evaluate fantasy in terms of Christian theology. A lot of fantasy is written with show more either a blatant, or subtle appreciation of "paganism" or nature worship. I was hoping for a broader discussion about how fantasy is relevant in modern society. While they have some interesting points, their narrow focus generally detracts from their credibility in evaluating the impact of the fantasy genre as a whole. show less

Dickerson draws upon philosophy, science, psychology, and literature as well as theology to draw his conclusions about the human experience in a digital age. He uses analogies to simplify some concepts. He draws heavily from the writings of B. F. Skinner, C. S. Lewis, and J. R. R. Tolkien in his arguments. The second part of the book was far more engaging than the first. This is one of the better treatments of the subject from a Christian perspective. It should appeal to the academic show more community. The second part will also have some appeal to a much broader community. show less

A little judgmental and biased as the other reviewer points out but a fairly good read nonetheless, especially if you're a fan of JK Rowling and other children's fantasy writers. I appreciated the research the author put into it and the historical context of current work.