Very much enjoyed Ben Care's piece on crime fiction -pondering its popularity and the reasons for its strange appeal. It is in my view a much underrated genre, and provides rich pickings for spiritual thinking (think for instance of Brother Cadfael's down to earth musings about life, people and the good Lord). It's always interested me that a number of very good crime writers are christians (G K Chesterton, P D James and Dorothy L Sayers to name but a few). I quite agree with his point that crime fiction, while sometimes being quite grisly and unpleasantly realistic about the evil embedded in human nature, is also, strangely and powerfully, hopeful. The bible is like this too, interestingly -pointing us forward tantalisingly to a final satifying resolution. The appeal of crime fiction is surely because of this strange and powerful hope that resonates with a more profound belief in the inevitablility of the gentle but strong truth eventually coming out and triumphing. Probing for that truth, helping it to surface, unearthing mystery, exonerating the innocent and rooting out the evil are all inherently very satisfying. Shouldn't these all be features of our day to day thinking, praying and living as well?