Plass, Adrian

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PLASS, Adrian

PERSONAL:

Married; wife's name Bridget; children: Kate.

ADDRESSES:

Agent—c/o Author Mail, Zondervan, 5300 Patterson SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49530.

CAREER:

Writer. Inspirational speaker and performer.

WRITINGS:

Join the Company, Marshall Pickering (Basingstoke, England), 1986.

The Sacred Diary of Adrian Plass (Aged 37 3/4), Marshall Pickering (Basingstoke, England), 1987.

Horizontal Epistles of Andromeda Veal, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 1988.

The Visit and Other Short Stories, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 1991.

View from a Bouncy Castle, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 1991.

Cabbages for Kings, Trafalgar Square (London, England), 1993.

The Stress Family Robinson, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 1995.

The Sacred Diary of Adrian Plass, Christian Speaker (Aged 45 3/4), Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 1997.

A Smile on God's Face, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), 1997.

When You Walk: Company and Encouragement for Ordinary Followers of Jesus Who Sometimes Find the Going a Bit Tough, Bible Reading Fellowship, 1997.

Father to the Man, and Other Stories, Acacia Press (London, England), 1998.

A Year at St. Yorick's, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 1998.

An Alien at St. Wilfred's, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 1999.

Why I Follow Jesus, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 2000.

(With wife, Bridget Plass) Colours of Survival, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 2000.

The Final Boundary: Short Stories and Parables, Marshall Pickering (London, England), 2000.

Ghosts: The Story of a Reunion, Marshall Pickering (London, England), 2001.

From Growing Up Pains to the Sacred Diary: Nothing Is Wasted, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 2002.

Nothing but the Truth: A Collection of Short Stories and Parables, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 2002.

And Jesus Will Be Born: A Collection of Christmas Poems, Stories, and Reflections, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 2003.

The Heart of the Family: Laughter and Tears from a Real Family, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 2003.

SIDELIGHTS:

A well-known Christian speaker, performer, and writer, Adrian Plass first gained a wide audience with The Sacred Diary of Adrian Plass (Aged 37 3/4), a humorous but often poignant take on the struggles of an evangelical Christian father and church member, including gently satirical takes on family members and fellow churchgoers. Plass has gone on to write numerous books, short-story collections, novels, biblical commentary, and a memoir on his own experiences as a social worker. In addition, his speaking engagements and various live performances of poetry and storytelling have taken him throughout his native England and as far afield as Australia, South Africa, and Bangladesh. As he explained on his Web site, his "motivation is [my] love of Jesus although some may say, and indeed have said, that [I expresses] it somewhat eccentrically." He noted that his "passion is to communicate the need for reality in faith, and a truth … learned during an extremely difficult stage in [my] life: 'God is nice and he likes me.'"

Known primarily for his many humorous writings and performances, Plass has also received critical commendations for a novel that takes a serious look at questions of faith. Ghosts: The Story of a Reunion tells the story of David Herrick, a widower of six months who receives an invitation from his wife's best friend in high school, Angela. It turns out that Angela has organized a reunion of members from David's old fellowship group, whom David hasn't seen in twenty years. Intriguingly, she also tells David that she has something for him that used to belong to his dead wife. What David finds is a group of people, each in their own way struggling with disappointments and doubts that have tested their faith and forced them to confront some of the simple platitudes they once shared. "Faith and all of its sometimes absurd trappings are portrayed with honest passion—Plass is never bitter or harsh, but always authentic," concluded a Publishers Weekly reviewer. "Both the setting and the story are dramatically different from typical evangelical fiction and will appeal to a broad spectrum of readers," suggested Library Journal reviewer Shawna Saavedra Thorup.