| name | The Chair: A Novel |
|---|---|
| orig title | |
| translator | |
| image |  |
| author | James Rubart |
| cover_artist | |
| country | United States |
| language | English languageEnglish |
| series | |
| classification | Fiction |
| genre | Christian Suspense |
| publisher | B&H Books |
| release_date | September 2011 |
| media_type | Hardcover, Paperback, Kindle |
| pages | 400 |
| isbn | ISBN 10: 1433671522 |
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The Chair is a Christian suspense novel by James Rubart, author of the New York Times best-seller Rooms, and Book of Days. Its major themes include restoration, healing and forgiveness.
The protagonist, Corin Roscoe, owns an antique shop. The book opens with a visit to the shop from an old woman, who delivers a wooden chair to him, saying that he needs it.
She tells him the chair was “made by the most talented tekton craftsman the world has ever known,” which the story quickly reveals is Jesus Christ.
The chair turns out to have apparent healing properties. A boy who visits the store and sits in the chair is healed of asthma, and it makes the local paper.
Corin has a brother, Shasta, who is paralyzed as a result of an accident that happened while he was skiing with Corin. Corin wonders whether he could sell the chair to pay for a surgery for his brother, from whom he’s estranged, or perhaps convince his brother to sit in the chair. He’s hoping the chair will heal his brother, and therefore, heal their relationship.
A chair allegedly made by Jesus that has healing powers doesn’t go unnoticed, however, and much of the book’s action revolves around Corin’s unexpected job of protecting the chair from Mark Jefferies, a slick mega-church pastor who is obsessed with the chair (and with his own popularity).
The book includes several storylines: one explores Corin’s relationship with Tori, a fitness expert and self-defense instructor who wants nothing to do with religion. Another plot line revolves around Corin’s obsession with extreme sports like cliff jumping and bobsledding down mountain roads, which he takes to even further extremes, flirting with death.