May 4, 2010

The archbishop of Canterbury recently observed that “P. D. James is our most Augustinian writer.” James’s reflections in her 2009 book Talking About Detective Fiction justify Rowan Williams’s claim. She writes that murder mysteries have an immense appeal because they treat the final crime: the intentional taking of human life, an evil that allows no earthly reparation. The title of one of her own widely admired murder mysteries, Original Sin, reveals her conviction that homicide has its roots in a primeval twisting of our native desire for God.

My last sermon at Covenant Baptist Church was on February 7, 2010. It was 20 years after the first sermon I preached for our community. I was the youth minister at the time, and the pastor was away. The only memory I have of that first sermon is a vague one. In my mind I can see the Duckblind Lounge, where we were meeting at that time. At some point in the sermon I looked away to the right and saw a kid in the back row, head back, mouth open, sound asleep.

Set in rural Louisiana, Udayan Prasad’s tender, affecting road picture The Yellow Handker chief combines a coming-of-age narrative with the tale of a man driven to seek the salvation he believes he no longer deserves.