Back in 1986, children's author Cynthia Rylant took on one of the biggest taboos in America literature.
She wrote a children's book about a forbidden topic.No, not abuse, abortion or drugs. Many authors had tackled those.
Cynthia Rylant had the nerve to write a religious novel for kids.
"A Fine White Dust" told of a boy named Pete who went through a fervent Christian conversion, only to learn the revival preacher had feet of clay.
The novel was a Newbery Honor Book.
Since "Dust," I've followed Rylant's work. She's written whimsical books about "Cat Heaven" and "Dog Heaven," for instance. And I've always been impressed with her sincerity. She didn't write "A Fine White Dust" to startle the establishment or chart a new course for children's literature. She's not a revolutionary looking for thorny issues.
She writes about religion because religion is in her mind and heart.
And she's honest about it She knows life -- even a religious life -- can be full of more sweet and sour than a Chinese cafe. She doesn't hedge.
That's why I've enjoyed reading her latest kids book, "The Heavenly Village," a collection of stories about a town for people who aren't quite ready to abandon earth and head to heaven. Those who want to lag behind to feed their cats or count their money end up in "The Heavenly Village" until they can finally "finish their stories."
"And here these reluctant spirits live," Rylant writes, "dressed once more in their earthly bodies, half a heart in heaven and half a heart on earth.
"They keep a nice little town. Things are always changing. People come and go. Messages fly. Something or someone is always being mended."
Especially mending. For "mending" is a major theme in Cynthia Rylant's work and life.
Rylant's parents separated when she was 4, leaving her with her grandparents. She's always felt the loss. And it's her heavy heart, I suppose, that gives her writing depth, just as her playfulness gives it bounce.
"Playing is still the greatest training you can have, I think, for being a writer," she tells kids. "It helps you love life. It helps you relax. It helps you cook up interesting stuff in your head. Probably instead of reading, you should be somewhere playing."
Like a blues singer, Rylant weds that feeling of lightness to a heavy heart and gives us something more wonderful than either. She gives us mixed-emotional truth. Candy companies would would kill for her ability to mix the bitter and sweet and produce a taste of soul, as she does in this snippet from "The Heavenly Village."
On earth, Violet Rose had had a very sad childhood. This is always something God has little power over. (And because of this, He sometimes has a lot of explaining to do to the new arrival in heaven.)
But God could not make Violet Rose's parents loving people, and He could not give Violet Rose a peaceful, quiet home, and He could not keep her tears from flowing.
He did what He could: He made white daisies grow outside her bedroom all summer long, and He sent a bright red cardinal to live in her snowy yard each winter, and He turned the moon a certain way each night so its light would shine upon her as she slept.
Eventually, something would take that leaden heart of Violet Rose and give it wings, of course, just as something took the leaden life of Cynthia Rylant and gave it a song to sing.
That something shows up often in her new book "The Heavenly Village."
It's called "religion."