Cain cross once dreamed of helping make a
dream worlds. Now their real world is being
attacked by a mental pandemic.
This 1 strikes as you sleep, sending its
victims into dark tunnels of despair to fight
for their waking lives.
We seek a cure for the nightmare virus,
the new Y
sci fantasy thriller from Nadine brand.
Speculative fiction like no other genre
reflects the creativity of God.
If you look at the scriptures, you're gonna
have see that God uses
imagination more than ration this discourse.
We are supposed to be image bearer
for a vastly creative God.
Reading fantastical fiction opened a portal in my
imagination for a place other than just a
materialistic world.
I experienced the gospel story with the mind
of someone who loved adventure and loved the
idea of light conquering darkness.
We're wired for stories that reflect how we
see the world in ways that are true.
The story is... Either pointing to christ or
it's pointing to our need for christ.
Welcome to the waking world a fantastical truth,
the podcast from a lord dot com in
which we explore.
Fantastical stories for god's glory. I meet Steven
Burnett burnett publisher of Laura And author of
a new science fiction adventure novel releasing next
year from Enclave publishing, and I just got
back from filmmakers, and so, I've only ever
had good dreams since that conference.
And I'm Zachary Russell, and I have this
recurring dream that is the last day of
college, Filmmakers and I completely forgot to attend
that 1 class that I should have been
studying for because now it's the final exam,
and I have no idea what's happening,
But thank goodness. I'm awake, and this is
episode 222.
What if you
had to fight your own dreams.
And yes, we will be talking to Nadine
brand about her new book, the nightmare of
virus, and I really hope we stay awake.
I pinch myself a couple times. I got
my coffee.
His man, I do not wanna fall asleep
while talking about nightmares that haunt you.
I can fantastical utilize that trophy dream just
a little bit zack by adding these words
and then the Dragons attacked.
Don't remember whether there are Dragons in nadine
dean's book, but there is a ultra a
lot of struggle. There's is a lot of
difficulty in some of the emotions that you
would associate with both nightmares and a pandemic,
Very interesting though, I think to hear the
origins of this story which we'll be doing
in just a moment as soon as Nadine
rolls into here.
First off, however, we did just get back
from filmmakers, and wow. What an event. We
have the Lore Haven open world,
awarded people who completed quests at that booth,
and no rest for the weary. However, we're
going ahead and preparing for the next rail
conference in 20 25
a bigger 1 this time crossover event and,
hopefully then Lord Willing, we'll be having a
bigger booth with more quests more prizes and
oh,
more books. Because while I'm working on my
sci f novel, Mary and Jacobs is finishing
her non fiction book about the difference between
a occult magic and fictional magic,
interesting
contrast there then fantasy and sci, and we're
gonna see both genres represented in this episode
as as soon as Nadine gets here.
Meanwhile, subscribe free at Lore Haven and join
the Lore haven gil just because we don't
have that booth open anymore at realm
book exhibit.
Doesn't mean you can't
undergo these monthly book quests with the best
Christian made fantastical novels in the Laurie Haven
Guild I'll share more about that later. But
you can also get reviews of the best
Christian made fantastical novels at Laurie, including our
review posted a few weeks ago advance review
if of the nightmare virus.
Speaking of which that is, of course, our
top sponsor again, for this episode, the nightmare
virus by Nadine brand is just released a
few weeks ago, Tuesday before realm,
some viruses go after the body, but the
nightmare virus goes after the mind
When dream technology goes wrong, the virus spreads
across the globe, trapping people in a universal
dreams scape, they call it the nightmare virus.
Kane Cross is determined to find a cure.
If he can decipher his brother's chicken scratch
formula notes, but when he gets infected, he
has only 22 days until he trapped in
the mental prison forever.
Now every time he falls asleep, he must
fight in a nightmare arena until he earns
his freedom to live in the new work
that exists only in the mind.
Then he finds a way to manipulate the
nightmare to change it by mere thought.
Forced to navigate a world of night beast
full mis blades and half truths.
Can turns his focus survival. Will he continue
searching for a cure or will he swear
allegiance to the nightmare? It's And the bigger
question might be, will he even have a
choice.
This novel comes from Enclave escape the nightmare
virus by award winning author and today's guest
Nadine Brand
available now wherever fantastic books are sold. You
can order our online or ask for it
that your favorite books seller or local library,
Enclave Publishing is a division of Oasis family
media, top sponsor, you can see that cool
cover, get more info, including the purchase link
in our show notes for episode 222.
Or go to lord ham dot com slash
podcast.
From there, I hear some squeaky wheels and
a very interesting structure rolling in, I'm going
to open the bay doors to receive our
guest.
Nadine Brandi has just rolled into the studio
in her tiny house on wheels.
She has been known to do wildly things
like doing that or writing a sleeper train
across Russia in the name of book research.
She is the 4 time Carol Award winning
author of 7 young adult books and has
been a professional fiction editor for over a
decade.
She is passionate about Jesus, motherhood and creating
with the creator,
But when she's not busy in inventing worlds
and magic systems, she is venturing through Middle
earth with her Aura husband and therefore. Half
children and lately venturing into the Lori studios
Nadine welcome for the first time. Thank you
so much. I'm so excited to be here.
Hey. Great. You have another fan of sleeper
trains? I got to do 1 of those
long time ago. So what what a cool
experience? Very, very cool. Think the last time
I rode a train was just some little
tourist,
affair either in the place I lived before
or The place I live now or perhaps
both. And nadine, I feel like you've been
on the show before, but in fact, it
was actually our interview a few years ago
back when Lord Haven had a print ish
you. So I've put that link at our
show notes for that interview in 20 18,
where you said a quote that turned out
to be the headline you of the interview,
quote, I process big questions through story in
quote. So I'd like to start there
with your origin story before we talk about
your new novel, the nightmare virus, your origin
story. How did you discover biblical truth and
fantastic imagination
at the same time in any particular order?
How did that go for your backstory?
Yeah. I'm probably
the rare author who didn't plan to be
an author. I love writing stories. I never
thought about publishing. I never thought about
writing books. I just had loved story all
my life. And
most of my life,
I've been journal. And that is how I
started writing my first stories.
Just like that quote said, I processed big
questions for story. And so I would do
that in my journal, the the teenager as
a young adult through college
and eventually, when I wrote my debut novel,
a time to die. I pulled so many
different quotes or descriptions or themes from those
journals that I'd written in, and they became
a part of the story, again it wasn't
until I finished writing that book that I
thought, oh, I
what about publishing? I guess that's the thing.
Maybe I'll look into sharing the story
with other readers and
that's kind of when my brain made the
shift from just
writing stories because I enjoyed them or because
they helped me wrap my mind around,
bigger questions, whether it's about life or about
faith or about my own personal journey that
made the shift to actually writing fiction
to share with other people.
So tell me about these journals. I mean,
were they just the standard
mole scanner were they're the ones with, like,
the lock and key, and then you gotta
hide the key from your, you know, your
siblings, to your parents or whatever was... That's
you're not a journal. I think that there's
a difference
between the... Some of my kids have those.
So
It depends what age asking about.
I I might... I lock and key all
the teenage drama. Nobody waiting needs to read
that.
Yeah. You know, I I used to be
a big journal or 2, but ever since
I've had, you know, computers and and type
everything.
I actually find it much harder, but but
kind of more
satisfying to use a handwritten journal. I don't
know if you found the same thing, but,
I mean, my handwriting is atrocious. And so
sometimes I'm like, Did I write this? Because
I can't even read that and my kids
make fun of me so like, yeah, don't
you know good handwriting? We learn this at
school?
So I... Are you still a journal now
even though you've you've had some books published?
I am. I still journal by hand, and
I think I'm mom, like, my 20 eighth
or t journal or something like that. I
don't journal quite as often,
but I do still process big questions or
big life changes and things like that, through
journal
and a lot of it goes hand in
hand with prayer and talking to the Lord
and as cheesy as it may sound. I
think Christian authors get it that a lot
of my inspiration comes from scripture or from
you know, listening to a sermon or my
time with the Lord, and that doesn't equal
a cheesy Christian
book, but it create the inspiration behind stories
from, you know, the creator, the original
inventor of story and imagination.
Oh, there's so much I could say here
about the implication that overt biblical themes equals
cheesy. They do not I'm going to move
along from that topic because it's probably another
episode. Probably 1 we've already done 2 or
3 times. But all this talk about journal
always makes me feel a little guilty as
if my journal, old journal is a sentient
being that I surrendered probably back in 20
14, 10 years ago, I will say the
journalism at the time killed my journal
It just wasn't enough time for more of
a personal writing like that, and then I
got into many other things once I changed
jobs, I switch from the Handwritten journal to
the digital journal, I think at age 18
when I got a laptop, but I can
certainly affirm this idea of sorting through the
big questions out loud in writing. And yeah,
I think in my case, like, J also
could,
become, an opportunity for rum dating. Whereas I
I probably also found a lot more opportunities
enjoying the stories by others,
exploring some of these themes not just through
my own journey, but through
character journeys. So, Nadine, I'm curious, what was
the switch then? Do you think, like, the
types of books that you enjoyed reading
that may be Drew out into other worlds
as well to the point where you even
wanted to start creating your own with a
time to die.
Yeah. I am a cliche reader. I was
inspired by all of the Harry Potter Hunger
gave, like, the books that inspired everybody. I
wish I had the
1 off rare book that nobody has really
heard of that changed my life. But no.
I just so
appreciate. Yes. Very very much so. But the
timing of those books were very important in
my life. I read Harry Potter as they
came out. I was the same age as
Harry with each book that came out. And
for me, I found a friend in that
story.
But there's a story in my life that
I'm gonna share here if we have the
time. When my parents had a rental house.
And so we were living in this rental
house, and there was a locked door in
the basement of this house. And we were
just told
It's locked it belongs to the owners never
go in there. Well, of course, me and
my sibling or we invented all sorts of
ideas what's behind the locked door.
And 1 day,
I was alone at home. I was a
teenager, and I found a key on top
of a door frame.
I bet this go. Keep locked the door,
and I... Emailed, do I wanna ruin that
mystery and find just a room full of,
you know, Dusty Furniture or something.
Of course, I did. So I I went
with the door, because I didn't tell anybody
an inside
floor to ceiling were stacks and stacks of
books, like more books than I could count.
Fiction, non fiction,
all sorts of things. And so I, because
I was I wasn't the best kid. I
didn't tell anybody that I found the key.
I would sneak in there, and I'd put
a pillow under the door so nobody would
know the light was on. And I would
read books, and that was how I found
Tolkien's book and I would sit there reading
lord of the rings. And so I had
this magical
secret room of book that got me
reading
beyond Harry Potter and beyond just the typical
things that I was encountering at school, and
it created a love for reading, but also
a desire to share that magic of finding
a story that felt like it was just
for me. That is absolutely spectacular, and it
sounds like 2 90 you were reading across
multiple genres are alaska guest Jerry Jenkins who's
written, I think maybe 200 books by now
has written all across these genres, sports bag,
ministry biography,
in times thriller, contemporary romance historical just everywhere.
And Too have also written in, historical fantasy,
dystopian Sci, and then the book will talk
about next nightmare virus.
Kind of a combination of some of these,
what leads to your interest in these different
types of genres, although, as far as I
can tell, they're always under the label fantastic
to?
Yeah. I
I follow the story. The next story that
comes into my head is the 1 that
I wanna write and I was told after,
the out of time series since they were
dystopian, I moved on to a different publisher
after that series, And that publisher, Thomas Nelson
said, well, you need to stick with that
genre, you're gonna lose your readers if you
hop a genres. But I thought, well, I
don't I don't have a story
in that genre. The only stories I have
are these historical fantasies would you like them?
So they took a gamble on me, but
that put in my head, oh, it's maybe
not standard for an author to jump genres.
And I think it's a little bit more
relax nowadays, more authors are realizing that the
readers aren't going to abandon them.
But for me, it was... I don't wanna
force a story in a genre
Jeff, for the sake of Genre, I'm going
to write the stories that I'm excited to
write, and I really get stories kind of
1 at a time. So I can't count
that I'm gonna have another story after the
only 1 that's in my head. I've gotta
write it and then see what comes next.
And thankfully, I've had publishers who are willing
to let me try genre hopping and
it's worked.
And and the books You know, my readers
don't mind. My readers don't mind and my
publishers have been very supportive in that. It
Genre hopping, though. When we have the nightmare
virus coming out list at the Lord Haven
library, we have 3 overall genre categories,
fantasy, science fiction and supernatural,
which can also include horror, paranormal,
just a contemporary story with some sort of
strong miraculous element there. It was difficult to
just add a check to the nightmare virus
because it's got sci f, but then once
you're in the nightmare world, it's a little
bit more fan fantasy proper in there, fantasy
creatures and magic and lightning bolts and all
of these things, So I think a lot
of readers maybe are more forgiving because they
realize that everything is under that label fantastical.
The genre to me, the overarching genre seems
to be
fantastical or speculative whatever whatever you call it?
Yes. I agree. And we as the authors
see it that way, and I do believe
our readers see it that way, but... Every
publisher sees it that way. So depending on
who you're talking to, it is Genre Hopping
or it's not. Yeah. Well, you're on social
media a lot, so you can...
Communicate to your readers why you're doing this
new genre compared to other ones, and so
they can... Oh, okay. That makes sense. And
then being accessible like that helps make sense
that. But I wanna go back to the
secret room of books? My goodness, what an
amazing
discovery is a kid?
And I wanna know did you ever get
caught. I didn't get caught, but I did
confess after we moved. Twice been never started.
Okay. Yeah because I was afraid if I
if I say, hey. I opened up the
door, then I'd be told not to go
in again. Or my siblings would wrap me
out, you know, I had to guard, I
would like a dragon, and that was my
treasure... You kept the secret from your... Siblings
as well as your parents that's quite an
accomplishment. I mean. I... I'm just struggling to
think like, if I was the parent in
that situation like, what I tell my kid
op stop reading those books. What are you
doing? That's so silly... I mean, I would
be, like, so secretly proud, like, you know,
just don't get caught again or whatever, But
I'm sitting here wondering like, do my kids
sneak into my study and grab a book
off the books shelf and then read it
while I'm not here or something, and then
put it back in exactly the same spot.
And I wonder if I should set, like,
little traps to see if they
if they're reading books. Yeah. Exactly. Hey, Nadine,
I'd like you to edit this opening sentence
for possibly the way I'll promote this episode
on? Social media, 1 warm night nadine broke
into the restricted section.
Well, Why I was there... 1 something...
Not warm. 1.
1 warm doesn't work. Yeah. It kinda starts
with that same consonant. So... Okay. So those
first 3 words need some work. But, you
breaking into the restriction section. Is, I I
think it's a pretty good hook. And obviously,
despite the sin that was involved there that
needed confession later. It led to some good
things.
And so finding that light in the midst
of darkness, of finding that good at coming
out of bad choices. It's something that our
author.
Is extremely skilled at doing.
Speaking of authors, though, let's go to our
second sponsor author Jamie Foley, who also has
a book. Coming out. I think this 1
is clearly labeled the fantasy.
It is book 3 in the Cat
revolution series
imagine being able to read game of thrones
without the guilt, not everyone has to die.
In this epic fantasy quart, The elemental have
decided their gods, and humans are fuel for
their fire.
The cat
revolution series began with book 1 Amber hawk.
Forward reviews gave this fantasy novel 5 stars
and described it as a heartfelt fantasy whose
ting of darkness don't threaten the end enduring
ship at its core.
Book 2 Silver blood was the winner of
the 20 22 Realm award for Christian Fantasy
ship and the highly anticipated book 3 Lotus
Fall releases August 13, watch for the cover
reveal from Author Jamie Foley on Wednesday, July
17
Before then you can visit amber hoc dot
com or your local bookstore to get yourself
a hard cover, paper back, ebook or audiobook.
Or pre ordered directly from the publisher at
faye press dot com to get a signed
copy and some super sweet swag that website
is amber hawk.
Dot com spelled like it sounds. You can
also get the links and see the previous
covers in our show notes for episode 222
or at laura haven dot com slash podcast.
Alright, Nadine, new book from you already out
so. We just had party about it at
the Realm maker's conference chapter 2,
everyone has dreams, but no 1 programs them.
It's so irritating. The dreams are almost like
this generative content
based on the text and image predictions drawn
from real life and who knows where
they jumbled together, they look strange. Sometimes people
have 6 fingers on their left hand. But
in this case, something different is done with
dreams in the world of a nightmare virus.
I'm curious what images or themes,
or ideas came together to help create the
origin for this new novel.
Well, themes
are a big part of how I come
up with my story ideas. And this 1
was very much
related to
what I'm gonna say it's probably gonna sound
very easy, but I know that I can
say it here and people won't take it
that way.
I was thinking about how we have this
relationship with Christ. We have this answer to
what happens at the end of life and
We have the hope. We have the gospel
and Jesus gave us that answer, and how
are we treating it as if our time
is very short.
You'll see a theme through my books with
my first trilogy, a time to die, and
the out of time series is very focused
on what do we do with the time
that we have.
And this book was my next idea after
that series. And so it was still in
that thought process of
how are we viewing the time that we
have. Our days are numbered. And as a
team, as a young adult, it feels like
we have forever,
but we don't know the time that we
have. And so that translate... You know, that
was a big thought for me, and I
was processing it through story, what if we
were put into another world or another reality
where time is literally
so much shorter and the nightmare world
is much shorter. You know, there's kind of
the the map of the time, how does
time work differently in the nightmare versus in
real life. And if we were in a
world where we knew that we really only
have a couple years left, but we also
have the answer to how to survive that
world. We have the knowledge of the cure.
How would we
interact with our fellow man? How would we
interact with world, that the world, How would
that change our thinking? And that was the
big concept, the big theme that sparked the
idea for the nightmare virus. So tell me
about this dream technology that's in the story.
Well, I couldn't tell you how it works.
That's proprietary,
obviously.
But it's very similar to
inception where
you can enter a dream, it started out
as a, you know, a commodity that people
wanted to purchase entering a dream for 1
reason or another a different dreams for celebration
or just for adventure or things like that
and something went wrong. And then now the
entire world,
every time they fall asleep once they're infected,
they enter into a dreams scape that
everybody goes into the same 1, it not
all these separate ones. It is just like
a an alternate
universe, and they can't figure out why that
happened happening or who created it or what
went wrong to make this happen, and that's
what the main character is trying to solve.
But you came up with this idea before
we had a different kind of pandemic and
lockdown downs and all of that about 4
years ago that I hear that right. Yes.
I had the idea for this book in
20 15. So
loud and clear. This is not a Covid
book it never was. When when Covid happened,
I I thought, well, now I'll never get
to write that book. Everyone's going to think
it arose from the pandemic or,
I just figured no publishers is going to
want this
because it's to close to home or it
sounds too similar or it's bark dread in
the readers, you know, even this the word
virus is on the cover. And we've really
tried to think of. Is there a different
title that gonna work better, and there isn't
that was just the best title for this
story.
So no. I had the idea par.
No, it's not so much AAA
virus so so much as a an infection
in the mind. It's not so much the
body. But the imagination that is being held
captive to these dark images. And I think
that that actually is a far more meta
an observation about what a lot of people
went through during lockdown downs and all the
all the mess of it is a lot
of these these haunting of doom.
That people had, and the despair, and the
fear of death, I know, there we go
again with the, teach teachers to number our
days, You know, there's a time to die
in a time to live,
type thinking there from ec,
but to remix that again and then to
maybe explore that in different way, I think
can only be helpful.
Like people were doing
during the lockdown. There was a lot of
harm done for sure, but there was also,
you know, what men meant for evil god
meant for good. And I see that so
many people
becoming aware of the temporal nature of life
and the the flaws of the medical establishment
and and governments and all of this. People
were being led to question what they I
thought was solid and forever.
And then they were drawn to realizing, no,
there really is evil in the world. And
after they realized it's Evil in the world,
they realize well, then that means there must
be a god. And a lot of people
now are reading scripture, I'm being drawn not
just too vague dia, but specifically to Jesus
and the gospel. Through this exact blend of
appeal to their heads and appeal to their
hearts. And so we got little bits of
revival going on. And I think that more
stories like this, although they're not meant to
just get people saved. You know, they're not
just evan
tools, you know, wedge
it's more about
ba the imagination to start thinking in these
terms of light and darkness and dreams and
nightmares. And then maybe even this theme from
the beginning where you have people
arranging their dreams and was escaping into this
dream world and then the dream becomes a
nightmare from which you must flee. I'm really
appreciating that. And we just by the way
Laura haven, we just had a review of
the nightmare virus. I would dream Has and
dimension that will have that link in the
show notes as well.
What has been the reaction so far
from people who have been blessed enough to
get an early peak at the nightmare virus,
and it's okay for you to say because
I just asked you about it.
I've been really pleased with the early reactions.
I I was wary at first because this
is a very different book than my other
books, and I said that a lot, and
readers are either going to lean into that
and like it or they're going to resist
it. And it has a very different tone
to it. Just... There's so much about this
book that is different and difference either good
or bad to the reader depending on their
taste. And all different almost all of the
early feedback that I've gotten has been very,
very positive. A lot of people have said
that it's my best book yet,
which
is blowing me away. I'm very... I'm thrilled
that they feel that way, I think that
they're connecting with the heart of the book
as I hope. And as I had prayed
and,
also,
I'm really proud of this. A lot of
people have said that they're hooked from the
beginning, which I'm notorious for having slow beginning
in my book. Flow doesn't mean bad. It's
just a different type of story. And most
of my readers, they know. Okay. I'll commit
through a slower beginning and it'll ease into
a bigger story. But this 1, I think
has my best intro the best book. All
of the things that I I hope to
do in a book someday, it just didn't
fit in my other book. So I've been
really encouraged. So the virus in this story
sounds kind of like a computer virus, but
but sort of like a
spiritual or a, like a psychological
virus rather than like a biological
virus, so I getting that right. So more
like a a brain worm. I guess there's
another term for it. Maybe you don't wanna
go with that because that's kind of a
weird picture, but then there's a cure that
they're trying to find. So... And I'm I'm
assuming that that is also not just like,
you know, a shot or a pill or
or something medical, but it... It's some other
kind of care. Now. I'm sure you don't
wanna give spoilers.
But can you tell us more about
what that search is like to find a
cure to find some kind of solution to
this nightmare?
Yeah. So the main character and his brother
are the ones trying to find a cure.
They wanted to be drafts men which are
people who make the dreams sc and So
they've kind of been immersed in that world
and when the virus when the nightmare my
virus comes, they're trying to find a cure
using the knowledge they've had
of the blend of imagination and being able
to program that. And there are specifics that
are left vague and left to the imagination,
but they are following what they know and
the more they interact with the nightmare every
time they enter into it when they fall
asleep, they're learning... Oh, wait, this broke some
rules. From what I knew. So how does
that change how we find a cure? And
then next time they go in? Well this
breaks rule that we knew to? So what
does that mean So
they're not just trying to find a cure,
but they're also trying to even understand
that nightmare world that they're in because They're
trying to cure something that seems to be
changing or inconsistent. They don't necessarily know what
the exact problem is to cure it. And
that's an internal and external journey of itself.
And did you ever have a dream or
a nightmare?
That found its way into this book that
you were inspired by?
No. But I will
kinda go further with that, I used to
have chronic nightmares for years and years in
my yam adult years. Very, very vivid
multiple times a night, lots of different ones,
it was different every time. You know, no
matter how much I prayed, they wouldn't go
away and
through those years of process and growing the
the lord? I started learning. Okay. Well what
does it mean to trust the lord when
he still allows my imagination to go to
these dark places?
Outside of my will. That was an interesting
journey of faith, and I'm very thankful for
it even though it wasn't wasn't at the
time.
But learning, well, how do I fight these?
How do I combat them through faith when
they're still happening? I'm not necessarily defeating them,
but I'm still in a battle.
And a lot of that carried over into
the story, those themes carried over into the
story, but I didn't necessarily put exact dreams
or nightmares that I've had into it.
Yeah. I I like that whole question of,
like, how do I trust the Lord in
the dream, you know, that's something I've thought
a lot about. By definition you're unconscious. Right?
So you're you're not awake,
but there's still some amount of your will
that goes on while you're sleeping and in...
Yeah. Like, if you've had the really lucid
dream
or the vivid dream where you're where you're
kind of more conscious than you are normally,
but it's still just in your mind, you're
not in real life.
You know, is there a moral dimension to
that. You know, I can think of a
dream where, you know, I committed a crime?
I know I didn't actually do that crime,
but I I didn't actually shoot that person
in in real life.
But I I guess I thought about it,
or I I pictured that, so you know,
does that carry over? And then... But then
there's also the other side of it, like,
if I'm going through something horrible in a
nightmare.
Is there a certain response Scott is looking
for for me. So I like that you
were asking that question. I did an article
like this about 3 years ago for Laura
Haven.
About this where, you know, you you think
about the decisions that
characters in the bible had to make because
of a dream that they had
So it's more about when they were awake,
but how God definitely used dreams
to prompt them to take action. Were were
there any other lessons that you learned from
that, that series of dreams that you had?
I did know, and this was something that
carried over into the book that when you're
dreaming, your emotions tend to be very different
than in real life, either heightened
or
non existent, you know, committing a crime, but
feeling no guilt or something that's north that's
typically normal, but you're feeling a lot of
fear about it. And so I did try
and
put that into the story when you're in
the nightmare world?
How are your emotions? Are they out of
control? And there were times in my dreams
where I could tell whether or not I
had the awareness or the the mental control
to make a decision, but then there were
times when I'd wake it from a dream
and I that everything my reactions in that
dream were completely out of my control. So
there were kind of different layers of
what control I had how much I could
tap into my my morals or
decision making and change that. So that
fusion that came or the inconsistency that came
was something that I had to find peace
with, and that was another spiritual journey that
I journal a lot through and talked with
the lord about and came to a place
of peace and being able to let those
go when I'm outside of dreaming.
Sometimes I have this dream dock and in
the dream. I'm Spider man. No, No. It's
not my dream. It's a friend of mine's
dream.
The Spider man too, which I thought was
hilarious because at the time I've been having
a lot of spider man dreams
By the way, I think, this could unlock
a whole une unemployed dimension of the pre
destination versus free will debate. Do we have
actual free will in James?
Even Lucid dreams or is this just an
illusion, but that's for another episode.
We just had a celebration for the nightmare
virus
at realm, and we also had the Lore
haven open world booth where we met so
many people including listeners to this podcast
and we promoted our new little slogan called
made by humans, and that's 1 thing I
appreciate about every guest that we have on
this episode works. Exploring their stories is that
they are
exploring their own stories and others from this
deeply human perspective. We want to encourage you
to keep doing that, with the Lord Haven
Guild. That is our exclusive community on discord,
our castle in the cloud, where we engage
monthly book quests
through the best fantastical Christian made novels that
we can find, but you can only join
the gil if you subscribe free to Lord
Haven updates which you can do at laura
haven dot com. Just look for the pop
up and enter your email and then we
will send you the secret code to join
the lore haven Guild to We're having more
members that join there now after the conference,
and we're gonna talk about the nightmare virus
and all kinds of other books. Are the
best ones that we can find. Or haven
dot com subscribe free and join the guild.
Next up Nadine, I mentioned that dreams help
us forecast the future So we always like
to get as many predictions as we can
if possible
for the third chapter of an interview like
this 1. The futures of reality and fantastic
world, so the nightmare virus is out, but
this is an idea that for you has
been sticking around for 8 or 9 years.
Us So I'm very curious before we even
talk about, maybe what's next for you. You've
been at this now for quite a long
time starting with the the out of time
siri with Enclave. Now your background of doing
stuff with Enclave. But what are some of
the growth signs that you've seen in the
genre? You've already mentioned, for example, about is
authors may be being a little bit more
free if they have faithful full readers to
be trusted to try some dystopian to try
some fantasy. I your last novel was called
you know. So not a whole lot of
dream viruses going on there. But what are
some
predictions patterns maybe that you might dare to
make about the Christian
fantastical world as a whole.
I think that
the desire for these types of book is
growing more and more. When I was first
published
with the out of time series, Christian
fantastical
books were fewer and further between than they
are now.
And now it's become accepted. It's not just,
oh, those weirdo over there who write that.
It's like, okay. Maybe they're weird, but maybe
I'm a little bit weird too or I
like to read weird, or I'll recommend weird
because it got Christian Beans or it's from
biblical world. Maybe And I think that there's
a hunger in readers leadership for stories that
stretch our imagination and help us grow in
that way while also still
I hate using the word clean because everybody
interprets that differently, but
Con Wholesome. Wholesome cotton. I love Wholesome.
There we go.
Yeah. Having for wholesome content or seems that
draws back to the lord or if we
just wanna read it for entertainment, it's Wholesome
entertainment.
So I think that it's growing and we're
seeing it grow for a reason, I think
in the future, it's gonna grow even more.
Those demand is even stronger. I think our
world, much of our world seems to be
going in 2 extreme directions. There is the
futuristic.
Let's invent as much as we can as
fast as we can and and follow that
rabbit or they're the people who are trying
to step back to a slower wave of
life and a lot of those people tend
to enjoy
low things like reading, the things that we
picture equaling a calm day or you're sitting
and you're growing your mind. And I think
growing your mind can happen in both of
those extremes, but I do see kind of
a rift happening in our culture and our
society. People choosing 1 of those 2 ways.
And I think reading is something that still
exists in both of those paths
and the demand for them is going to
come strong onto to Christian publishing. And so
if you're a Christian writer,
Now is the time. That is definitely the
time.
Yeah. I I definitely think we are living
in a a time where we... Like you
said, we're very... Split over technology
because we...
Technology is in.
But but maybe a dystopian version of it
is escape. You know, it's it's not inevitable.
I was in some conversations this weekend about
key fob, for example, like how cool You
used to just be a key that you'd
have for your car. Right? You could have
extra copies of it. You could you could
even keep 1 in your wallet or you
could keep 1 of those little magnetic boxes
you put under your car. And then a
long time the key fob, and it did
all have all these buttons did all these
things. You could even start your car remotely
with it.
Of course, it has a battery And that
battery runs down. So what we need a
better solution. So how about an app that
you keep on your phone? Well, maybe I...
Leave my phone at home or something. So
I've got my watch. I've got my smartwatch.
So that's always gonna open my car. And
it's just like, every step it's, like, almost
like unnecessarily complicated, but it's like a solution
to the previous technology that was not complicated
enough, I guess. It's so
This is only gonna accelerate. There's no slowing
this down. We are gonna live in a
world that's just increasingly complicated.
And I like books like this that show,
hey, there's a technology that's gonna take over
the world. Is literally gonna take over your
dreams in your mind.
And here's how it's gonna go wrong, but
here's what people are gonna do about it.
To me that's sort of comforting because in
a weird way. Like, I'm very comforted by
dystopian
stories where they're... I'm assuming there's a happy
ending. Mean, it's a Christian worldview. So we
kinda have that built into our world.
But it's where we can see
even though I walk through the valley of
the shadow of death. God is gonna be
there with me. Even though I might live
through this crazy dystopian cyberpunk world, whatever you
wanna call it, like there is a way
through it. I think that's really the the
most comforting thing you can do rather than
like, just look back what if all the
technology went away. Like I don't think it's
ever going away.
But there's going to be a way that
we find through it. I'm looking forward to
more and more stories like this. I I
think we're increasingly living in a Sci world.
You know, I grew up loving fantasy, and
now I'm I'm switching more to Sci because
there were these viral commercials from At and
T back in the 19 nineties, It's like,
can you imagine a time where you can
check out any book in the world
from a computer.
And can you imagine a world where you
can get on a pay phone and
see your loved ones on a screen and
it's like, okay. Is first of all it's
funny that you have to go to a
library to get a digital book and second
of all, you have to go to pay
phone, like they... It's like they couldn't imagine
a world where pay phones didn't exist.
That whole vision of the. It seems so
second So Kits and, u. That that'll never
happen. And now it has happened.
And now it's increasingly
happening,
you know, just this week, Spacex
announced that they've had 5 launches already in
4 weeks, I think of their latest
rocket. And so I like that you are
focusing the reader on that like, we're entering
this fast paced world, but in a book,
you can take the slow path through thinking
about it. You know, not not avoiding it,
not
going back to the old times,
But how can we live through this time
as a accretion. So I I hope to
see more of this from a lot of
authors?
I think that's a great perspective. Well, I
like both Sci f and fantasy. I I
think we all do. And nadine we just
recently had this kind of fake war with
the enclave authors and incoming enclave authors.
Over the summer about the Sci f versus
fantasy and I'm convinced
that 100 percent of the participants were feeling
like a double agent this whole time
because I don't think anyone is just a
complete Sci fire or fantasy partisan,
Did you take a aside in that could
you even take a side in that? I
mean, I was kind of kidnapped onto the
Sci f side, and I feel like even
with nightmare virus, like you said they're definitely...
Fantasy elements, my editor and I call my
book Science Fantasy because it's so in the
middle. You know, I tried to keep the
piece as much as I could.
Right. It's not a just a a squishy
position. It it is a biblical
position. There's elements of fantasy and Sci in
almost every story and Sci likes to play
around with Fantasy and the fantasy likes to
play around with Sci f. Although it does
seem that For example, Star trek can have
a complete fantasy episode within Sci f constraints
whereas if you put. Phase into your medieval
castle
seems a lot stranger. So maybe 1 can
get away with it more than the other.
But I asked for predictions earlier, the nightmare
virus is out. Do you have any a
story ideas?
Announcements you wish to leak
going into 20 25 and beyond on your
part. I have nothing that I can leak.
But I can't say something's coming. Okay. And
I'll have to leave it at that. I'm
sworn to secrecy. Yeah. Hurting your first folks.
Breaking news, breaking news. Something
is coming,
and you can take that to the bank.
And there's... That's un.
Wonderful to know. Wonderful to know. Well, they
needed. It's been great having you the nightmare
virus out everywhere. You can get the hard
cover and get the audiobook book, all of
that, where can folks keep track of the
something that is coming as well as these
stories that you've already made in Fantasy Sci
f and everywhere in between. Yeah. My website
nadine Brent. Dot com, but I'm most active
on Instagram and through my email newsletter.
If you wanna make sure that you don't
miss any announcements, my newsletter is the place
to be and it wouldn't hurt to follow
my publisher on place publishing.
Yeah. Or if you can find Nadine journal,
and you, you have... A secret key that
goes into the lock, You know, maybe you
can find out some more information. To find
a portal. I just wanna know if there's
space in the tiny house a for a
restricted section because I understand a lot of
folks living in tiny houses have to go
for electronic books, and I hope you'll always
keep a secret space for physical branding hobbies
just for the books. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe it's
says bigger on the inside. You know, there
you go. Now it's kinda of fantasy inside
the same time, Nadine, thank you so much
for stopping by and gods being with the
nightmare virus and every other story you create.
Thank you so much for help.
Steven, that was so interesting to hear in
nadine.
Point out how when you're dreaming your emotions
tend to be very different. You don't feel
the things you think you should feel or
you feel things that you can't quite explain
they they seem a little out of place.
And when we wake up, you try to
make sense of that. We've talked about dreams
in the Bible a little bit, there's an
article wrote that you can go check out
in the show notes something I'm very fascinated
by right now, and this is more... So
in my day job
is people from the Middle East who have
dreams and visions, of Jesus or other things
that lead them to Jesus.
And I'm actually working a little project of
my own to try to capture those stories
because there is something very powerful about the
way that God can speak to people do
their dreams, and I don't totally understand the
rules of that, but it does seem to
be very common among people from the Middle
East. I've I've heard up to 1 half
of people that become Christians from that background
have had basically supernatural dreams.
And so to you are listener, I've I've
always wanted to hear from other people, were
their dreams you had that you are convinced.
Were from the lord that that lined up
with something in scripture that led you to
some active repentance or that helped you make
some big decision in your life were you
ever a drafts,
as Nadine said, where you took control of
a dream,
and you started having a lucid dream where
you could fly or you could... Know, do
whatever you wanted, but you knew you were
asleep or have you had reoccurring nightmares
and, you you had to figure your way
through that. So send us a note about
any of these topics,
podcast
at laura haven dot com or you can
also comment
on our episode page at lori haven dot
com or find us on Facebook,
Instagram and Twitter.
Next on fantastical truth,
Then the Lord said to Joshua.
Stretch out the ja that is in your
hand toward Ai
for I will give it into your hand.
Well, there you have it straight from scripture,
clear biblical evidence to oppose artificial intelligence.
Right? Well, at the same time, many people
do see advantages. To these tools, including but
not limited to the generative Ai tools,
but how can we celebrate the virtue of
stories made by humans. We just had some
amazing conversations about that at realm makers.
In light of our new hashtag along with
buttons and books stickers that we just launched
at
called hashtag
made by humans. We're going to explore that
next week. Stickers As you are enjoying stories
made by humans. I hope that you also
have good dreams. I hope that they reflect
of the peace and goodness and joy, of
our Lord Savior Jesus Christ. I don't care
that it sounds cliche. He is the give
of all good dreams and sometimes he even
brings them to life
We look forward to that ultimate
enjoyment as we are staying awake and continuing
to seek and find his fantastical trip.