Atonement—more than fiction?

By Barbara M. Vining Contributing Editor

A novel can be a catalyst for important insights into human nature that can stimulate a spiritually motivated reader to prayerful self-examination and improvement. Ian McEwan's Atonement is such a book.

With his masterful ability to take us into the inner workings of the minds of his characters (most notably, the book's main character, Briony), McEwan illustrates the destructive effects that passionately held personal views can have on others—and the difficult task of atonement in the mind of the view-holder.

The story opens in England in 1935, when Briony is an impressionably naive teenager. At thirteen, she is already deeply engrossed in her passion for reading and writing literary fiction. This, coupled with her driving ambition and current efforts to be an influential writer, colors her view of everything she observes. On a particular summer weekend gathering of relatives and friends at her family's Gothic estate, Briony's miscalculations lead to disaster.

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