Burn the witch.

So I've been called blasphemous. More than once. Moi? I know. Hard to imagine, isn't it?

But there are a lot of Christian schools in the UK and some of them seem to think that repositioning God as a sex-mad teenager is wrong.

The thing is, as a lifelong atheist, the book I meant to write should have turned out quite thoroughly blasphemous (if by blasphemous you mean not entirely in line with traditional religion). But goldarnit, in that strange way books have of getting away from you, this one turned out to be just the teensiest bit less of an atheist tract than I ever EVER intended.

A sneaking confirmation of faith may even have slipped in by mistake.

Those of you who've read it, back me up here.

In any case, I'd like to know what happens when you open up religion to creative discussion. Does it lay down its humble little self and die? Do churches collapse? Do people give up on belief after thousands of years and say, Gosh, I must've been horribly mistaken?

I'm guessing...not. Religion and belief thrive on discourse, occasionally carried out in a thoughtful manner, very occasionally without guns and martyrs. Very very occasionally with a bit of humour thrown in. (Ok, not usually.)

But anyway.

While the theological pundits are settling in for the evening and the book burners are building their pyres, there's huge furry news here at Rosoff acres.

Yes, there will soon be an actual real live Eck, brought back from the brink of extinction, yours to own. OK, maybe not live. But extremely life-like.

I've had preliminary pictures of him from my brilliant Eck-designer friend in New York City, and he's fantastically Eckish, in the best possible sense of the word.

More details to come very soon. In the meantime, I hope you're eck-cited.