Writing Christian Fiction That Isn’t Always Tidy

When I first started writing Christian fiction, I carried this quiet fear: What if my stories are too messy?

What if my characters ask hard questions about God?
What if they fall apart before they find grace?
What if the endings don’t wrap up neatly with a bow?

But the more I wrote, the more I realized—that’s the Gospel.
It meets us in the mess.

In my own life, I’ve walked through seasons that didn’t have clear answers. I’ve sat with grief that didn’t resolve quickly. I’ve felt God’s silence so loudly it echoed through everything. And I couldn’t write characters who didn’t wrestle the way I did.

Because the truth is: faith isn’t always tidy.

The Gift of Honest Struggle

In When I Lost Me, Catherine walks through the ache of miscarriage and infertility. She doesn’t smile through it or slap on a verse. She mourns. She doubts. She waits. And in that space, I found healing in writing her.

In The Daughter’s Truth, Emmy deals with betrayal and the weight of a family secret that threatens everything she thought was stable. She’s not always strong. She doesn’t always get it right. But God meets her anyway.

And in Where the Lion Roars, Asja-Rose is grieving her husband in the South African wilderness while questioning the God who now feels impossibly distant. Her faith is torn. Her pain is real. And yet—even in the silence—grace whispers.

I’ve had readers say, “Your books feel like someone understands what I couldn’t say.” That means more to me than any accolade. Because I don’t write to preach. I write to walk alongside.

Real Doesn’t Mean Hopeless

Let me be clear—my books may not always end “happily,” but they always end with hope.

Because that’s the heartbeat of the Gospel: not perfection, but restoration.

God doesn’t promise we won’t suffer. He promises He’ll be with us in it. And I want my fiction to reflect that—the presence of God in the ordinary, the broken, the unsure.

Why I Keep Writing It

Sometimes Christian fiction is expected to be clean, predictable, and “safe.” But real faith isn’t safe. It’s surrender.

I write characters who yell at God, cry in silence, fall into things they regret, and find themselves in places they never expected. Because I’ve done the same.

But I also write characters who are pursued by grace. Who find unexpected community. Who forgive. Who rebuild. Who rise.

Because I’ve lived that, too.

So if you’ve ever read one of my books and thought, “She gets it”—know that I don’t have it all together. I’m just telling the truth as best I can. And I’ll keep writing the kind of Christian fiction that isn’t always tidy… but is always honest.