Robert Mullin says:

Okay, well, I can’t cast the first stone here.  My novel does contain a kind of conversion scene (more of a switching of allegiance, but it does exist). But overall, I’m of the persuasion that the story better really, really need it.  I think that conversion scenes have the vulnerability that a love letter has; in the wrong context, they tend to come off hokey and trite, and nowhere near as intimate as they were intended. Moreover, they tend to be an excuse to work in The Sinner’s Prayer, and well, if that’s the best you can do, you should probably start from scratch.

True conversion may or may not be a private affair, but it does tend to be a rather personal one. An imperfect analogy, if I may: while there is nothing inherently wrong with wanting to extol a love scene between a husband and wife, reading it tends to be a very different experience. It generally comes off awkward and a bit voyeuristic, and not really as moving as we might like. On the same token, it is very difficult to write a conversion that does everything the author intends it to do.  

I think it was Hemingway who said that there was nothing particularly hard about writing; you just have to sit in front of your typewriter and bleed. True soul-baring writing is poignant and unforgettable. Writing that is meant to manipulate the emotions tends to come off as exactly that: manipulative.

Did you ever see the movie Legends of the Fall?  If you did, and liked it, I apologize for what I have to say next. If you did, and felt the way I did, I think you will know what I mean. I HATED that film. From the very beginning of that film all the way to the wretched end, I got the distinct feeling that the filmmakers wanted to make me feel bad. And you know what? It worked. I felt that I would not get those two hours of my life back. But I didn’t feel sad. I didn’t care about the characters, precisely because they were as foolish and miserable as the filmmakers depicted them, and you might as well have had the scriptwriter standing in the background with a large applause sign with the words “CRY HERE” emblazoned on it. It didn’t work, precisely because they tried too hard to make it work. On the other hand, I bawled at The Mighty and Bridge to Terebithia … and I knew what was coming.  What made the difference? The scenes in those films were integral to both plot and character, and the viewer was allowed to react, rather than being forced to.  

I would really have liked the author to address some of the more powerful, compelling, or even necessary conversion scenes in literature.  I think one would be hard-pressed to name a really good one, and one could probably make a much better case that the absence of them is much more effective. In the Chronicles of Narnia, you don’t have people confessing their sins to Aslan and professing him as their lord and lion for all time. They simply follow/obey him (or don’t), and reap the consequences of their decision. By the time Edmund “converts,” you had already been shown his regret, and the moment of truth between Aslan and himself is left private, something alluded to, but offscreen (if just barely). He says he’s sorry (“repents”) to his brother and sisters, and that’s enough. Remember “when you do this to the least of these…”?  Even in fiction, or perhaps especially in fiction, we demonstrate love for God best by demonstrating it to others. We don’t need moments of paint-by-numbers repentance and conversions so much as we need moments to stir our souls and make us ponder our relationship to God. 

Bainespal says:

I’m going to say I neither revel in nor revile the stereotypical Christian conversion scene, as I never thought of them that way when they were in favor

I think that is ideal.  Maybe that’s how pre-Evangelical Christianity would have viewed conversions — as an important step in the journey of many or most Christians — not as the beginning of that Christian’s story and certainly not as the end of it.  But Evangelicalism obsesses over the conversion, or the professed experience of the conversion, the personal “testimony.”  That comes through in Evangelical fiction and art.  The goal of getting people to profess faith became the chief end, an end that has come to justify almost all means.  I don’t go to a radical fire-and-brimstone church, but even my church teaches that sharing the gospel is the primary duty and goal of every Christian.  The old senior pastor of my church has even said, once, that the reason God doesn’t rapture us to heaven as soon as we are “saved” is so that we can share the gospel with others so that they can be “saved” too.
 
So, the world became weary of the Evangelical obsession with conversion stories, both in real-life and in fiction.  And some Christians who really do believe have also become weary of it, doubting that explicitly telling the gospel narrative and inviting people to pray to receive Christ really is the most important goal and duty of every Christian.  So, many people in the general public, including some Christians, have come to shun any deliberate use of a conversion in fiction.  This doesn’t mean that the conversion scene is inherently bad or artificial.  It means that a lot of people have a problem with the conversion scene, because it’s been made into a Big Issue.  And the bitter irony is, those of us who are uncomfortable with conversion scenes being a Big Issue guarantee that they will continue to be a Big Issue by protesting all conversions scenes.