Dancing Priest

Author and Novelist Glynn Young

Dancing Prophet

He’s Got Me Rereading My Own Books

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Pastor Bill Grandi has three posts last week on his rereading of my Dancing Priest series. On Tuesday, Bill discussed the difficulty of reading the fourth book in the series, Dancing Prophet, because of what it was about. It was a difficult book to write, and it became somewhat prophetic, including when the Archbishop of Canterbury resigned for helping to cover up a scandal in the Church of England.

On Wednesday, Bill discussed a conversation between Michael and Sarah Kent-Hughes in Dancing Prophet, in which Sarah observes how hard it is to be one of the workers sent in “to clean out the pipes.” And on Thursday, Bill writes about a scene in the fifth and last in the series, Dancing Prince, in which Michael’s two sons, Henry and Thomas (or Hank and Tommy, as they’re known by the other characters), are discussing “calling,” or being called by God as described in I Samuel 16:1-13, the rejection of Saul and the anointing of David.  Coincidentally, the pastor at my church used that passage as the text for his sermon this morning. 

Bill’s post led me to start rereading my own books. I’ve already finished the first two, Dancing Priest and A Light Shining. (Amazon has the Dancing Priest pages messed up; the Kindle version is here; the cheaper paperback price is here, but it’s still more than it’s supposed to be.)

Originally, I had planned on doing only those two books. They were written as one (huge) manuscript of about 150,000 words. But the publisher and I had a conversation about what might happened after Michael and Sarah returned to Britain, and it was in that conversation that I described what could be the plot lines for several more books, including what would become Dancing Prophet and its difficult subject. Two weeks later, the publisher sent me a short news clip; the difficult subject had become a horrific reality. That reality continues 13 years later, with the resignation last year of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

After rereading A Light Shining, it is my prayer that its subject – religious violence that nearly tears Britain apart – never becomes reality. 

When Fiction Seems to Predict Fact

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The Dancing Priest novels seem to be back in the fiction-becomes-fact business.

Last week, after saying he would not resign, Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby did, in fact, resign. This followed the release of the Makin Report, which documented the failings of the Church of England (COE) in a cover-up of an abuse scandal. The scandal went back to the 1980s when a barrister named John Smyth abused young teens at COE church camps, slipped out of England when it appeared the law was onto him, and went on to victimize more boys in Zimbabwe and South Africa.

Welby’s sin: he learned about the abuse in 2013 but failed to report it to authorities. Smyth could have been brought to justice at that time; he died in 2018.

One as-of-yet-unanswered question is if Welby was the only COE official to know. It’s unlikely that others, including people high in the hierarchy, also didn’t know. The scandal may not be over. And lest we think this type of scandal only happens to the big established denominations like the Church of England or the Roman Catholic Church, there are lessons here for all of us. A church I’ve attended had a member of the staff get involved in an inappropriate and illegal relationship; the difference was that the head pastor, as soon as he was told, called the police. That’s how it’s supposed to work, no matter how damaging it might be to an organization’s reputation. Righteousness trumps reputation, as Bernard Howard wrote for the Gospel Coalition.

In Dancing Prophet (2018), the fourth of the Dancing Priest novels, Michael Kent-Hughes has an abuse scandal thrust upon him. He’s a former COE priest and now the king, and he’s simultaneously dealing with a developing church scandal and a collapse of the government of Great London. His church nemesis is the Archbishop of Canterbury, Sebastian Rowland, who has spent considerable time covering up an abuse scandal that threatens to blow the church apart.

During the research for the book, I learned that the Archbishop of Canterbury, along with the rest of the hierarchy and the church itself, is subject to the monarch. That’s how Henry VIII set it up in the 1530s during the English Reformation. And the archbishop functions at the pleasure of the monarch. That the current prime minister, Keir Starmer, refused to back Justin Welby publicly was of less importance than the silence that was coming from King Charles. Welby’s announcement noted that King Charles has graciously accepted his resignation. That’s how it works. The Catholic pope tells God and the church; the Archbishop of Canterbury tells the king (or the king asks for it).

In Dancing Prophet, Michael tells Sebastian Rowland he must resign. Rowland at first refuses, until Michael, in the presence of the police, explains the evidence against the archbishop, all of which will be made public. It’s worth noting, too, that Michael went to the police as soon as he became aware of the activities of one priest, which would soon explode into a global crime. And Michael, when he speaks to the British people, will tell them that the Church of England may not survive. Righteousness trumps reputation.

Dancing Prophet was written long before the John Smyth scandal was known publicly. What I did know concerned a COE abuse scandal involving some priests; it had first surfaced in the news in 2012. For the novel, I adapted the abuse scandal that has rocked (and continues to rock) the Roman Catholic Church to the COE.

I’m not a prophet; I can’t and don’t predict the future. But I’ve learned that, when you’re doing research for a book like any of the Dancing Priest novels (“future history,” one reader called them), you pick up on issues, concerns, trends, and ideas that are being discussed. You read about past events and troubles. You learn how people, especially people in authority, respond to what they see as threats. And you know what humans naturally tend to do: wish it would all go away, ignore it, make it worse, try to contain it, or cover it up. It might work for a time, but it usually doesn’t work forever.

We forget that lesson: righteousness trumps reputation.

Related:

Can Fiction Predict the Future?

Did Dancing Prophet Become Prophetic?

Top photograph by Ruth Gledhill via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Did “Dancing Prophet” Become Prophetic?

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In 2012, I had a conversation with my publisher about the future novels planned in the Dancing Priest series. Dancing Priest had been published in late 2011, and the publication of A Light Shining was imminent. I walked him through what I saw as the main subjects and themes of several additional books (another six, if I remember correctly, which eventually became another three). 

The fourth book was to focus on the conflict between Michael Kent-Hughes and the Church of England hierarchy, which would eventually lead to a reformation. The catalyst would be a child sexual abuse scandal, happening over decades and facilitated (as in, covered up) by the church. The inspiration for this was the scandal in the Roman Catholic Church; what I did was to transfer the Catholic scandal to the Church of England. Or so I thought.

Two weeks after that conversation, my publisher sent me an article that had just been published in Britain. It looked like the Church of England had its own, homegrown child abuse scandal, and didn’t need any fictional help from the Catholic church. 

Dancing Prophet, the fourth novel in the Dancing Priest series, was published in 2018. That year, more revelations were unfolding about the Church of England. In 2019, an independent inquiry was established to look at what had happened and why. Last week, the inquiry panel released its study. 

It sounded like the story line in Dancing Prophet. My wife says I need to stop writing about things that become true.

It gives me no particular joy that real events seem to follow several of the key events in the Dancing Priest stories. (Sometimes, the correlations aren’t horrific, like the DNA study made of Vikings that sounded a lot like what happens in Dancing Prince.) But it does seem uncanny at times. I don’t have the gift of prophecy, but I’ve asked myself, how do real events happen that mirror the stories I wrote in my five novels?

I don’t have a solid answer. I have an idea of what happens, and it has to do with the research I do for the stories and the work experience I’ve had.

The Dancing Priest novels are not historical novels in the strict sense. They’re not about the past. They are more futurehistorical novels, because they’re set in the soon-to-happen future. (One reviewer has called them alternative historical novels.) But they are based on considerable reading and research and first-hand experiences on visits to London and England.

The streets Sarah’s car has to take from Buckingham Palace to the Tate Britain (Dancing Prophet)? I’ve walked them. The visit Michael makes with the two boys to the Imperial War Museum and the Guards Museum Shop (Dancing Prince)? I’ve done both. Taking a train from King’s Cross Station (Dancing Prince)? Been there, done that. A tube ride from South Kensington to the Tower of London (Dancing King)? Yep. And the books I’ve read have ranged from Peter Ackroyd’s multi-volume History of England and a history of coronations to a domestic history of the British royal household and a history of the Church of England.

My work experience has also served as a resource. Working for two Fortune 500 companies, a Fortune 1000 company, a public institution, a newspaper, and my own business has taught me a lot about how organizations respond to crises. Almost by default, the initial response is self-protection. The ongoing response tends to be self-protection. And that response can put public relations people in very difficult positions. The fact that the Church of England responded to its child sex abuse crisis almost exactly like the Roman Catholic Church did is no surprise.

You don’t have to be a prophet when basic human nature never changes. 

Top photograph by Cajeo Zhang via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Dancing Prince Available for Pre-Order

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A mother’s last words, a father’s final message, and a strange painting: Michael Kent-Hughes faces personal tragedy, one that leads to long-lasting damage to the relationship with his youngest child, Prince Thomas. As the young boy grows to adulthood and the estrangement from his father continues, he finds his own way in life. But in the boy’s hands and heart will lie the future of the kingdom. Dancing Prince is the moving conclusion of the Dancing Priest series.

Dancing Prince, to be published about July 1, is now available for pre-order.

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What readers say about the Dancing Priest series

“At least a dozen times, I had to stop reading Dancing Priest for a moment to control the tears. The story is that gripping, that real.”

“I found myself not wanting Dancing Priest to end. There was so much imagery and amazing detail in the story. As an artist, I was amazed at how accurately he understood us.”

“In turns suspenseful and heartwarming, A Light Shining has all the qualities of those classic tales that stay with you for the long journey. These characters become friends and fellow sojourners, making their way into a reader’s heart and encouraging a deeper faith – one that has hands and feet. We all need such role models as Michael and Sarah Kent-Hughes.”

“Read A Light Shining any way you can: Kindle, Nook, paper. Be prepared to leave long blocks of time to read. Guaranteed. Be prepared to be captured with this story.”

“With Dancing King, it is such a joy to be back in this world, which is so well-rendered it could qualify as alternate history. And no one writes a crowd scene like Glynn Young.”

“Themes of redemption, restoration, courage, and community run deep through the lines of Dancing King. Once again, Glynn Young exceeds readers’ hopes, showing a main character in Michael Kent-Hughes who continues to mature in his faith and leadership

“In Dancing Prophet, Glynn Young continues to weave a great story with stirring characters and plot lines that anticipate the headlines. This book gives him a chance to give more backstory to some familiar characters while moving our principals, Michael and Sarah, forward into their new roles. I only wish book 5 was already out!”

“It’s 3 am but I just finished reading a wonderful book that I couldn’t put down, the fourth book in the Dancing Priest series by Glynn Young, entitled, Dancing Prophet. Wow, it lived up to the greatness of the prior three books.”

An Incredible Review of “Dancing Prophet”

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Dancing Prophet

Writing a novel is a hard, lonely work. You often struggle through a story, writing and rewriting and editing and deleting whole sections because, well, they’re just bad and aren’t going the way they need to go. And when you finish writing a novel, if there ever be such a thing, you have all the worry and anxiety and disappointment of how people will respond. 

And then you read a review, like “A Prophet Raised Up for Such a Time as This” by Luke Herron Davis.  And you tell yourself this is why you write. 

My Interview with Megan Willome on “Dancing Prophet”

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Dancing Prophet

Where does a story come from?

The idea for my novel Dancing Prophetcame from the my regular route for riding my bike, and the nondescript apartment complex I passed. I recently talked with writer and author Megan Willome about where the story came from, the major issue that affected it, and how it began to seem that my fictional story was writing the news. She captured exactly what I was trying to do in telling the story.

You can read the interview here.