If the American author Katherine Paterson had been writing a century ago, her evident Christian commitment would not, of course, have been anything out of the ordinary. Instead it would have been the expected norm, with a large area of common ground known to exist between the writer, her readers and her reviewers. But how does an author deal with such a commitment now, when the common assumptions are not nearly so widespread, and to express them explicitly may alienate rather than attract?… Looking at Katherine Paterson's novels, I think the use she makes of her beliefs in them is something of a phenomenon for the late twentieth century, and an interesting one. Perhaps the use she does not make of them is even more interesting.

Her Christianity is not that of the more recent born-again or charismatic movements; hers is the traditional Presbyterian variety, and has been...