The Brought Family Secrets: Defenders of the Light

A Christian sci-fi / suspense novel by Tami Stevenson.

Published by Suwannee Valley Times.

To friends and neighbors, they are your average, rural Christian family that live and love on their sixth generation farm in Michigan. But the Brought family has kept a secret for generations. They have been blessed with extraordinary gifts from the Father.

When an ancient temple complex is discovered along the Au Sable River, near Lumberman's Monument and their favorite fishing hole, their gifts ultimately involve them in joining forces with angels and aliens to fight the dark powers that lie buried beneath.

Will Ben convince his pastor the Bible isn't wrong just because ancient structures are being discovered and the earth may be older than we thought?

Is the Bible wrong if aliens do exist?

Will the most beautiful creature he's ever seen, the love of his life, survive the sacrifice she made?

The Brought Family Secrets: Defenders of the Light

The Brought Family Secrets, front coverThe Brought Family Secrets, back cover

Publisher's Weekly review of The Brought Family Secrets: Defenders of The Light

Stevenson debuts with this inventive Christian thriller that pits a family of believers, charged for generations as “defenders of the Light,” against unholy threats and mysteries, including demons, black mists, and the extraterrestrial. The angel Eliel, an old family friend, comes with “a memory of the past … and a memory of the future” for Ben, the Brought family’s gifted adult son, along with a revelation: their patch of rural Michigan is home to a lost, ancient temple built by the God-defying, giant-birthing “Watchers”—a temple that will soon be unearthed. Nature-loving aliens called “Willows” appear before the Broughts with a warning: when the temple is discovered, demons will be unleashed.

Memorable characterization, a fast pace, and a thoughtful reconciling of biblical fantasy with Christian belief set this series apart. The family’s already comfortable with aliens, including the Dubheians and the Starlings, both representative of a variety of “Others” whose presence, since the time of Adam and Eve, is noted in lost books of the Bible. The Broughts keep this secret for convincing reasons, but Stevenson is thoughtful about how to fit space-faring entities into Christian cosmology: “We need to remind people that whether any of this is true or not, it doesn’t matter when it comes to their salvation,” one Brought notes during an early multi-chapter exploration of secret histories.

The past’s mysteries also get excavated more literally in exciting sequences plumbing newly revealed tombs, complete with terrifying sculptures of dragons whose role in the climax readers will enjoy anticipating. As the family works to stop researchers from setting loose demons, Stevenson offers twists, revelations, a wedding, and above all a sense of adventure. The unfussy prose stays earthbound even when the characters quite literally take flight, but the plotting, worldbuilding, and cast are all promising and will appeal to Christian readers looking for fantasy that takes their beliefs seriously.

Takeaway: This Christian fantasy pits a Michigan family against a lost tomb, demons, and ancient secrets.

Publisher's Weekly Print Date of this review: 02/20/2023


 

 

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