CSFF Blog Tour: The Enclave Day One

This month we're taking a look at The Enclave by Karen Hancock. I've loved Hancock's books in the past. The Legends of the Guardian King were fantastic and are high on my list of "books I gotta reread sometime soon." Problem is, new books keep hopping onto my "books I gotta read for the first time" list. Maybe sometime three years from now...

Anyway, on to the book at hand. The story revolved around Lacey McHenry, a new employee at the Kendall-Jakes Longevity Institute. She's the "frog girl," working in the labs caring for the experimental animals. But then she's attacked by a strange boy. She's saved by Dr. Cameron Reinhardt, one of the geneticists on staff. He patches her up and makes sure she stays safe.

But then the higher-ups at Kendall-Jakes cover up the attack. They suggest that Lacey's attack was really a psychological episode brought on by stress. All is not well for Cameron either. He's approached by someone from his past with a special mission for him. Soon Lacey and Cameron are trapped in the middle of a major conspiracy, one that revolves around ancient sarcophagi, strange enclaves, and the head of the labs, the egotistical Director Swain.

Hancock's writing is exciting and gripping. The first chapter grabs you and draws you into the story. There's plenty to enjoy as the tale unfolds.

But as much as I looked forward to reading this book, there was a lot that bothered me about this story as a whole. Two and a half big things in particular. I'll start with the half-a-thing today and cover the two other big things over the next two days.

The half-a-thing is this: predictability. One of the strange things about the story is that of the New Eden Enclave. After a few chapters, we seemingly jump into the future, to an ark-like building that contains survivors of some sort of apocalyptic disaster. That threw me off for a moment or two, but within a few pages, I had it figured out. So when the "big reveal" happened, my response was "Well, duh."

It's not a big thing. I still enjoyed the book for the most part, but like I said, there are two major things that bothered me about this story. I'll discuss them both in greater depth over the next two days.

But wait! I almost forgot (shame on me!). If you want to judge this book for yourself, I have a copy to give away! That's right, you too can check out this book and see what you think. All you have to do is leave a comment on any of this month's blog tour posts (today's, tomorrow's, and Wednesday's) with your e-mail address to enter the drawing. Disguise your e-mail address with spaces and words (like using [at] or [dot] or something like that) so spammers can't get you. On Thursday, I'll put all the entries in a hat and someone will draw out the winning name. Maybe my son. If I can get him to pick only one. So enter now, enter often. Post a comment once a day if you're interested.

While we wait for tomorrow, be sure to check out what the other tourists have to say:

Brandon Barr
Jennifer Bogart
Keanan Brand
Grace Bridges
Canadianladybug
Melissa Carswell
Valerie Comer
Amy Cruson
CSFF Blog Tour
Stacey Dale
D. G. D. Davidson
Janey DeMeo
Jeff Draper
Emmalyn Edwards
April Erwin
Karina Fabian
Beth Goddard
Todd Michael Greene
Heather R. Hunt
Becky Jesse
Cris Jesse
Julie
Carol Keen
Krystine Kercher
Dawn King
Mike Lynch
Melissa Meeks
Rebecca LuElla Miller
Mirtika
Eve Nielsen
Nissa
Steve Rice
Crista Richey
James Somers
Speculative Faith
Stephanie
Rachel Starr Thomson
Steve Trower
Fred Warren
Elizabeth Williams

Zombie Defense Plan

I'm beginning to worry that I may be warping Isaiah a bit too much.

Tonight Jill made chicken pot pie for supper and she decided we were going to try to get Isaiah to eat it. That can be something of a challenge at times, because if he decides he doesn't want to try something, there's very little you can do to persuade him otherwise. But we were going to try to do it anyway, so Jill gave him a slice but also gave him grapes and Texas toast (both things we know he'll eat) just in case.

And sure enough, Isaiah wouldn't even look at the pie. He kept cramming his face with toast. So Jill scooped up a carrot.

"You like carrots, right? This is just a piece of carrot!"

Well, Isaiah does like carrots and so he tried the little piece. He got his "I'm not sure about this" face so we resorted to our usual playacting. "Yum! Isn't that good?"

It worked. He was willing to eat more carrots so long as it was only carrots.

But then a piece of corn got stuck to a carrot and Isaiah insisted that it be removed. Rather than do so, I opened my big mouth.

"That's just corn. You know, like what gets thrown at the zombies?"

Some of you may be raising eyebrows right now. About a month and a half ago, I purchased the game "Plants vs. Zombies" and Isaiah has watched me play it. One of the plants you use to stem a zombie invasion of your house is a "kernelpult" that tosses tiny kernels of corn and pats of butter at the zombies. Isaiah knows this offensive plant. He always points it out when I plant one. So I figured making that connection would be helpful.

It actually worked. He devoured that bite and was willing to eat more corn.

So I decided to press my luck. "You need to keep eating your veggies so you can be big and strong and fight off the zombies."

Do you see how this might not end well for us?

Actually, it wasn't so bad. At one point, Isaiah was worried that the zombies were coming. Not scared really. He just stopped and said, "If you don't eat this, the zombies will come." We assured him that Daddy had eaten his pie and that he could fight off the zombies with Isaiah.

Then Isaiah said, "If you eat your toast, the zombies will get a truck." I have no explanation for that.

So I guess Isaiah is our zombie defense plan because he did eat all of his chicken pot pie and we celebrated that the zombies were not coming.

The things you do when you're a parent. No, scratch that. The things you do when you're a weird parent.

W-------- Wednesday

... what was that? I was supposed to do what this week? Writing?

Oh shoot. I knew I forgot something.

I have no excuse. I can't even claim that I need a break or anything. It just didn't happen.

Well, that's not entirely true. I have been doing some writing, just in a different medium. I've been using the Spore Galactic Adventures game and writing adventures for my fellow players. Just made one tonight called "Clark and Stanley tend bar." I'd explain but it'd probably take too long. Suffice to say I'm on a bandwagon with that one.

I'll have to do better this week. I think part of my problem is focus. I know that in two weeks, I'll be pulling Numb off the shelf to see how bad the damage really is. I wasn't sure what to do in the meantime. But after giving it some thought, the best thing is to probably go back to The Escape. I've got some ideas how to jazz it up a little. We'll have to see how it works.

Or I'll just wind up making more Clark and Stanley adventures.

Homeward Bound

Maybe the problem here is that I read the last book first.

I'm normally a fan of Harry Turtledove. He produces some great counterfactual history stories and I've read some great short stories of his as well. But in spite of his sterling reputation with me, Homeward Bound fell short for me, and I say that with a great deal of irony.

Like I said, this is the last book in a series, one with the following premise: what if aliens invaded during the height of World War II? One minute, the Axis and Allies are at each others' throats. The next, they have to cooperate to repel the invaders. They are a bunch of lizards who call themselves the Race. Human beings have to fight tooth and nail to survive and, eventually, they begin to adapt. They steal loads of technology from the Race, advancing in leaps and bounds.

Homeward Bound picks up toward the end of the twentieth century. Things have stabilized on Earth and so the United States casts its gaze outward toward Home, the Race's homeworld. They've been tinkering with cold sleep, the suspended animation the Race uses to traverse the distance between stars. And so now, the U.S. is ready to send a delegation to the Race to try to hammer out a mutual peace.

It's not an easy task. Sam Yeager, a man seen as a traitor by most of the U.S., is sent (mostly to get him out of the way on Earth). So are his son and daughter-in-law. An assortment of other people are sent hurtling through space. Theirs is no easy challenge. They have to overcome the deeply entrenched pride and prejudice of the Race to convince them that they are equals. This becomes incredibly difficult when messages from Earth reach Home, hinting that the balance of power is about to shift dramatically.

This could have been a great book. I love the way that Turtledove described the Race. They were definitely alien beings. I also liked the way he portrayed the human race after living with the Race for half a century.

But this book really didn't do much of anything for me. For starters, it was too repetitious. Turtledove described people going into cold sleep at least half a dozen times, using very similar language. And then he described the same half dozen coming out of cold sleep, utilizing the same jokes. Then, when the humans are on Home, we see the same scene at least three times. And when the balance-tipping point comes, we see the same argument several times. Quite honestly, I think that Turtledove could have cut out all the repeating information. He could have easily saved us at least a hundred pages (maybe more) if he had.

The other major problem is that there were so many missed opportunities in the book. It never really went anywhere. Moments when the mission could have been put in mortal danger were glossed over or winked at. The balance-tipping point is hinted at so strongly I knew what was going to happen at least a hundred pages before it did. And the ending sort of fizzled (thanks to even more repetitious scenes!).

Maybe the problem is that I haven't read the other eight or ten books that came before this one. As a result, I had no clue who most of the characters were and had a hard time mustering any sympathy for them. Well, that's not entirely true. I could sympathize with them. But I kept wanting them to do something interesting. Instead, they mostly just sat around and talked.

So don't bother with this one unless you've read the others in the series. As for me, I don't think I'll be revisiting the Race any time soon.

"Wordcount" Wednesday

I don't really have a word count to report this week. As I said a week and a half ago, I finished Numb. This week I spent about half an hour printing the manuscript out and it's now going on the shelf for about a month or two so I can get some emotional distance. Right now, I think it's a pile of garbage (it's a first draft, after all), but my opinion might change.

So what have I been up to writing wise the past two weeks? Not too much. My side of the family went to a cabin up at Leech Lake in northern Minnesota for a week. Great name, right? It was a lot of fun. Finished reading a book, played lots of Wii games my brother and his wife thoughtfully brought, and hung out with the kids a lot. For example, I had the great privilege of helping my son cross the mighty Mississippi on foot. Well, at the headwaters, anyway.


But I did get to read through The Escape, my NaNoWriMo project from this past November.


The crazy thing is, I remember thinking that this was the biggest pile of garbage I'd ever written. Now I think there are some good parts. The ending, in particular, works quite well.



There are soft spots that need fixing, though. The characterization of my main character needs some work so she can show some growth by the end. I also have some key concepts that need to be introduced better. And I think I have some notes somewhere around here from when I wrote this thing.

It looks like July will be spent in rewriting land. First comes The Escape. I have to somehow synthesize some of the ideas I've got knocking around in my head and gel them all together. After that, I might take another crack at Return of the Mourning Dove, a secular fantasy I wrote a year or two ago. One of my fabulous critique partners sent me back a manuscript's worth of notes and I haven't had the chance to sift through them all yet. And by the time I'm done with all that, it might be time to take a run at Numb again and see what I can do with that.

What has me a little worried right now is that I don't have any new ideas to work on. I've actually been looking at brainstorming books in Barnes and Noble to see if they might have anything that could help. We'll have to wait and see.

Wordcount Wednesday Redux

I really did not think I was going to make it. Honestly. There was so much packing to do, so many little things to take care of before this week-long vacation. I kept looking at where I was in the book and where I had to be to consider it ended. And I was sure I'd need to keep working for at least another two or three days after we got back from vacation.

But I made it. Numb is in the can, so to speak. I just put the final words down on the screen.

So here's the final count. 76,294 total words, forty four chapters plus an epilogue, 319 pages total. That means that I added a whopping 12,193 words to the manuscript since Wednesday night. I honestly don't know how I pulled this off.

But the victory is a bit bittersweet. I think this is probably the messiest first draft I've ever written. Seriously. There are at least a dozen scenes that I'll need to put in when I go back and rewrite this thing. I think I made a major reveal three different times and I don't think I got the timing right with any of them. The last five chapters were sprinted through at best and need fleshing out.

But hey, the rough draft is done! I can go on vacation with a clear conscience, knowing that I made my goal. Like I said on Wednesday, I'll be looking at The Escape, a secular fantasy I wrote last November and marking up the pages as much as I can.

As for Numb, this one goes on the shelf for July. I'll come back to it in August and start cleaning it up. But for now, I did it!

Wordcount Wednesday

Once again, it's time to update my myriad readers (said with tongue firmly planted in my cheek) on my writing progress. As of tonight, I have written a grand total of 64,101 words for Numb. That means I've managed to add another 6,750 words. Good progress, I think.

But now I'm hard up against it. I really wanted to get this done by Saturday night and, as much as it pains me to write it, I suspect I won't make it. Off the top of my head, I'd say I'm 3/4 or maybe 4/5 of the way through the story. Hard to say. If I can really knuckle down I might be able to make it.

So why the rush? Well, I think I've said this before, but Sunday afternoon, I'm leaving for a week-long cabin vacation and I fear that if I don't have the book done by then, a week away from it will pretty much kill my momentum.

Next week we won't have a Wordcount Wednesday report. But that doesn't mean I won't be doing some writing related activities. Over the next week, regardless of my status with Numb, I'll be reading and marking up the first draft of my NaNoWriMo project from last year, tentatively titled The Escape. Perhaps part of what I'll be doing is trying to find a better title.

So pray for me! I hope to have this all done soon!

CSFF Blog Tour: Vanish Day Three

Well, this is embarrassing. I, once again, seem to have peaked too early. I know I promised some spleen-venting today, but as I thought about it, I realized that it wouldn't be fair to vent on Tom Pawlik or Vanish. What has me upset is not Pawlik's fault. He told the story he had and my grumbling is more at the market in general than one book in particular. Let's just put it this way: I long for the day when a Christian book can have lots of aliens in it and be appreciated and successful. There, I said it.

So let's see what I can find by rummaging around in the other blogs in the next few minutes:

• Keanan Brand has some interesting thoughts about the visibility of the Christian Writers' Guild label and on how Pawlik created suspense in his book.
• Grace Bridges has a brief interview with Pawlik that contains one of the most disgusting and apt metaphors for writing I've seen in a while.
• Beth Goddard saw through the supposed alien nature of the gray beings right away and, like me, seems to have been surprised by what it turned out to really be.
• Poor Cris Jesse believes the post office took the book's title as some sort of command. Never fear, Cris, it's worth it!
• Blog Tour Overlord Rebecca Luella Miller (we love you! Long may you reign!) suggests that this book might actually be Christian horror (I'd buy that) and she also has an interview with the author. And she hints at potential theological thorns that she'll (hopefully) elaborate on today.

I could probably go on, but I think those are some pretty good links there. Did I miss something? Go find out on your own:

Brandon Barr
Justin Boyer
Keanan Brand
Grace Bridges
Karri Compton
Amy Cruson
CSFF Blog Tour
Stacey Dale
D. G. D. Davidson
Jeff Draper
April Erwin
Karina Fabian
Alex Field
Beth Goddard
Todd Michael Greene
Ryan Heart
Christopher Hopper
Joleen Howell
Becky Jesse
Cris Jesse
Julie
Carol Keen
Krystine Kercher
Margaret
Rebecca LuElla Miller
Eve Nielsen
Nissa
John Ottinger
Donita K. Paul
Epic Rat
Steve Rice
Crista Richey
Hanna Sandvig
Chawna Schroeder
James Somers
Speculative Faith
Rachel Starr Thomson
Robert Treskillard
Steve Trower
Fred Warren
Phyllis Wheeler

CSFF Blog Tour: Vanish Day Two

Abandon all hope, ye who have not read Vanish by Tom Pawlik.

You have been duly warned. If you keep reading, you're going to find out a lot about the story, the resolution, and all that.

Like I said yesterday, the folks who survived the strange incident find themselves in a strange predicament: an abandoned city, strange beings on their tails, a rash that spreads from person to person, and it seems as if time has unhinged itself. They seem to be lurching forward at random for little or no reason. What could have happened? Who are the gray creatures attacking them?

That's the real mystery. They're described as tall, featureless, unable or unwilling to step into the light. Who are they? What do they want?

The one theory that gets floated early and often is that it's aliens. It explains the mysterious lights the survivors saw in the storm. The beings are clearly inhuman, so it seems logical that they'd be aliens. As much as I was rooting for them to turn out to be aliens, I knew it couldn't be true. For starters, this is Christian fiction. Aliens seem to be strictly verboten (although I'm hoping that's beginning to change). Second, the idea was floated so often and so urgently, I knew it had to be a dodge.

And what a dodge it is. It turns out that the survivors ... well ... aren't. In any sense of the word. The creatures are a sort of "reaper," bringing in a very grim harvest. And the Chicago and environs they occupy isn't the real world. It's a metaphysical region between life and death called Interworld.

It took me a while to catch on to that. Even though I knew it couldn't be aliens, I had no idea what it was going to be until Conner Hayden put it all together. Once I realized what was going on, though, I sat back and thought, Gee, I think I've read this before.

And I have. In some ways, Vanish is very similar to The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis. In Divorce, Lewis plays with an old doctrine called the refrigerium, a belief that God gives "holidays" to the damned so they can get a small taste of heaven. If they repent and acknowledge their need for salvation, they're allowed in. If not, they go back to hell.

Lewis's story starts with the narrator waiting for a bus to hell. He takes a trip to Lewis's version of purgatory, which he envisions as the front porch of heaven, a place where a person "toughens up" so he or she can survive the glories of paradise. For a soul from the murky world of hell, purgatory is simply too real. The grass cuts his feet. A simple brook is too solid to walk on comfortably. The narrator in this short book works his way through purgatory, seeing the redeemed pleading with the lost souls to give up the sins that bind them and come into heaven. In the end, it turns out to be a nightmare.

For those of you who have read Vanish, I think the parallels between the two are pretty obvious. Lewis's character travels to purgatory, a land between heaven and hell. Pawlik's characters are trapped in Interworld, a region between life and death. In both stories, the main characters interact with strange beings almost beyond their comprehension. The similarities are very striking.

So I guess the question is, which is better? In terms of quick readability and entertainment value, Vanish wins, hands down. Lewis's The Great Divorce is more philosophical and artistic. But quite honestly, if I were to choose which one is better, the one I'd want to read several times over, I'd go with Lewis every time. He may preach, but he never gets too preachy (which is one weakness in Pawlik's ending).

Am I the only one who thinks so? Go find out:

Brandon Barr
Justin Boyer
Keanan Brand
Grace Bridges
Karri Compton
Amy Cruson
CSFF Blog Tour
Stacey Dale
D. G. D. Davidson
Jeff Draper
April Erwin
Karina Fabian
Alex Field
Beth Goddard
Todd Michael Greene
Ryan Heart
Christopher Hopper
Joleen Howell
Becky Jesse
Cris Jesse
Julie
Carol Keen
Krystine Kercher
Margaret
Rebecca LuElla Miller
Eve Nielsen
Nissa
John Ottinger
Donita K. Paul
Epic Rat
Steve Rice
Crista Richey
Hanna Sandvig
Chawna Schroeder
James Somers
Speculative Faith
Rachel Starr Thomson
Robert Treskillard
Steve Trower
Fred Warren
Phyllis Wheeler

CSFF Blog Tour: Vanish Day One

You know, I always try to come up with some clever way to say "Here we go again" whenever we begin a new blog tour. Every single month. And I've probably repeated myself who knows how many times. So let's just dig into the book, mmmmkay?

This month we're looking at Vanish by Tom Pawlik. The story centers around a number of people but mainly focuses on Conner Hayden. He, along with a small group of people in and around the Chicago area, witness an unusual sight one evening. A storm rolls in off the lake, filled with multicolored lightning. When they awake the next morning, everyone has disappeared. The survivors of this mysterious event band together, desperate to figure out what happened to their family and friends.

But answers are in short supply as even more mysteries present themselves. What is the strange rash that is spreading over some of them? And what about the gray beings that seem reluctant to come into sunlight. Conner and the other survivors travel across country, trying to survive but it would seem that things are stacked against them.

This is a very fast paced book. I knocked it off pretty quickly. It's also a very visual book. I could often picture exactly what was happening throughout, almost like a little movie playing out in my mind. It's easy to see why this book won the Christian Writers' Guild's Operation First Novel in 2006. It's a spellbinding book with a rollicking mystery that kept me guessing right up to the very end. From what I understand, there's a sequel that was just released, namely Valley of the Shadow, one that I may have to check out sometime.

So what's in store on the Least Read Blog for the next two days? Well, tomorrow I'll be slinging around some major spoilers, so be forewarned. The reason why is because as I read this book, I couldn't help but think of a very similar book by a well-known Christian author, so I thought we might do some low level contrasting and comparing. As for Wednesday, I may have to vent my spleen a little. Just a little. Not too much.

So come back over the next two days, gentle readers, for spoiler flinging and spleen venting. And be sure to see what else is going on amongst the other tourists:

Brandon Barr
Justin Boyer
Keanan Brand
Grace Bridges
Karri Compton
Amy Cruson
CSFF Blog Tour
Stacey Dale
D. G. D. Davidson
Jeff Draper
April Erwin
Karina Fabian
Alex Field
Beth Goddard
Todd Michael Greene
Ryan Heart
Christopher Hopper
Joleen Howell
Becky Jesse
Cris Jesse
Julie
Carol Keen
Krystine Kercher
Margaret
Rebecca LuElla Miller
Eve Nielsen
Nissa
John Ottinger
Donita K. Paul
Epic Rat
Steve Rice
Crista Richey
Hanna Sandvig
Chawna Schroeder
James Somers
Speculative Faith
Rachel Starr Thomson
Robert Treskillard
Steve Trower
Fred Warren
Phyllis Wheeler

More Than a Skeleton

And so my Maier-binge comes to a close with More Than a Skeleton. This is, by far, the weakest of novels by Paul Maier, and I'll explain why I think so in a bit.

Professor Jonathan Weber is back. It's a few years after "the Rama incident" (i.e. the events of A Skeleton in God's Closet) and Weber has encountered another enigma in the person of Joshua Ben-Yosef. He is a charismatic Jewish Christian who has appeared in Israel with a small coterie of a dozen followers. Joshua at first seems to be nothing more than a charismatic preacher, elaborating on Christ's teachings. But then he starts performing miracles. He turns water to wine. He heals a blind man. He seems to have supernatural knowledge. As the world becomes aware of Ben-Yosef, more and more people wind up asking themselves, "Is this guy Jesus?" Weber finds himself embroiled in another controversy that could wind up changing the course of Christianity forever.

Like I said, this one isn't quite as strong as the other books for a variety of reasons. In some ways, Weber comes off as kind of arrogant and even a jerk at times. The plot is a bit muddled too. Maier spends the first chapter giving a much needed (if a bit harsh) critique of dispensational premillennialism, followed by a libel trial that seemed tacked on and a bit unrealistic. As things are revealed toward the end of the book, I found myself once again thinking that the whole thing is a bit too far-fetched.

Don't get me wrong, it's still a good book. Not the greatest, but when put on the balance of Maier's other excellent novels, it comes out a bit wanting.

A Skeleton in God's Closet

I don't often remember the circumstances surrounding the purchase of a book. But I do in this case.

It was my senior year in high school. I had gone to Praise Unlimited, the local Christian bookstore, to see if there was any new music in. There wasn't. Out of curiosity, I eyed the lengthy book section. I had never ventured over there before. So I decided to take the plunge.

As you can imagine, this being the early '90s, I didn't find much of interest. Lots of plaintive women stared back at me. But there was one with a provocative title: A Skeleton in God's Closet by Paul Maier. Yeah, there was a woman on it, but there was a man too, digging something out of the ground. I picked it up and flipped it over to see what the back had to say.

I was floored. Basically, the back cover copy asked a tantalizing question: what if an archaeologist found something that would destroy Christianity?

I was on the fence. Should I get it? Well, a sticker from Thomas Nelson on the cover said that if I didn't like the book, I could mail it to them and get my money back. So I decided, since I couldn't find any music I liked, that I would take the plunge.

And I am so glad that I did. This book is still my all-time favorite. Dr. Maier brings his considerable scholarship to bear to make a great thriller centered around Jonathan Weber, a Harvard archaeologist who makes what seems to be the find of the century. But as they continue to work, they unearth more than they bargained for and, sure enough, their discovery threatens to tip the entire Christian faith into chaos.

Part of what I loved about this book is that Maier does an extremely good job of constructing his scenario. Weber's discovery is put together so well that you seriously wonder how Maier will get his characters out of the predicament. And he also does a great job of constructing what could happen if the foundation of Christianity was somehow ripped away.

I keep coming back to this book and re-reading it because I do enjoy it so much. Although there was a recent event that tracked so closely to the plot that I almost wrote to Dr. Maier to accuse him of being a prophet. Thankfully, that incident has been largely forgotten.

But as you can see, this book isn't all that forgettable for me. Give it a try.

So I guess my Maier binge is almost over. All I have left is More Than A Skeleton.

Wordcount Wednesday

It's been a weird week. Unfortunately, our home computer has spent more time at the Geek Squad than in our home thanks to a weird, persistent slow-down problem. It's a long story and I won't go into it here. Suffice it to say, I've gotten to know one Geek in particular over the past three weeks. Well, it went back in Monday and just came back today, fresh from a "restore." In other words, wiping everything and reconstructing it from the ground up. I spent the afternoon re-installing a bunch of the programs I use and ... well, let's just say I've been distracted.

That's not to mean that I haven't been able to write. God bless the person who invented laptops, especially the team that constructed mine. It's been traveling from church to home with me, which allowed me to write 5,041 words this week for Numb. This brings my total up to 57,351. I think I should still be able to be done by a week from this Sunday, when I begin a week long vacation. At least, I hope I can make it.

Last week, Robert Treskillard, a colleague of mine from ACFW whose daughter is brave enough to wear kilts to a national writing conference, asked me what my end goal is for Numb. When I started working, I set a finish line of 70,000 words or so. Again, I have no idea if I can make it or not, but we'll have to see.

The Flames of Rome

It would seem that I'm on a Paul Maier binge right now. That's okay, because The Flames of Rome is a great novel.

It starts in the hey day following the Emperor Claudius's conquest of Britain. The story revolves around Flavius Sabinus and his career and life. Things seem very good for Sabinus and Rome in general until Claudius is succeeded by his stepson, Nero. While Nero had a good start (thanks in large part to his tutor, Seneca), he descended into debauchery and madness, dragging much of Rome with it.

When a fire breaks out in Rome, consuming a good protion of the city, Nero needs someone to blame. It falls on the Christians, who he then murders in a number of them.

You may have noticed that while I say the novel revolves around Sabinus, I've spent most of the review speaking about the politics of the day. That's because while Sabinus is the main character, her moves mostly through the upper echelon of Roman society. The details Maier layers into the story from history (all well documented with endnotes) is incredible and helps bring the era to life.

Once again, though, craft is the Achilles heel of an otherwise good book. It's a bit weak in terms of simple craft. The historical details more than make up for it, though.

A word of caution, though. Nero was a horrific individual with some rather ... how shall I say this ... Well, I can't think of a polite way to put it. He was a pervert, pure and simple, and Maier dosn't pull any unches when it comes to describing his debaucheries. Nero's not the only one with such proclivities. Be warned, this is not a book to give to a younger reader and people who are sensitive to such things might want to avoid it.

For the rest of us who want an unflinching look at first century Roman society, this is the book for you.

Pontius Pilate

What a difference a few years make.

Pontius Pilate is one of the first Christian novels I ever read, maybe fourteen or fifteen years ago. It's an interesting concept: rather than writing a straight historical novel, Dr. Paul Maier (an eminent Biblical scholar and historian) set out to write a "documented historical novel." He set a few important rules for himself: use accurate names (if it isn't known, it's not given), no contradicting any known fact (even for the sake of dramatic license), and only using "constructed history" when he absolutely had no evidence one way or the other.

So Maier sets out to tell the story of Pontius Pilate, the Roman prefect who judged Jesus and sentenced Him to crucifixion. But Maier takes a long running start at the trial, explaining the climate of Tiberius's reign, what Pilate experienced as governor, and what he may have seen after his return to Rome. Maier shares his research in a series of extensive endnotes. According to the second edition preface, nothing discovered in recent years has contradicted anything in the book.

If you're looking for a great book to help illustrate the political and societal pressures Pilate faced while acting as the Roman representative in Judea. Where the book is weak is craft. There's a lot of telling, lots of info dumping to explain historical data. If you're looking for information, those things are fine.

In spite of this, it's a good book to read. Everyone should.

The facts are these...

... the Piemaker got the raw end of the deal. And so did we, the viewers.

Jill and I watched the final episode of Pushing Daisies tonight. I'm going to miss this quirky, well written show. Snappy dialogue, bizarre plots, and incredible sets. Every show was a delight.

But sadly, I think we deserved somewhat better.

What I mean is this: it's obvious what the producers of this show did. When they found out that they were getting the ax, they had only shot a season finale (complete with what I think would have been a terrific cliffhanger, sure to bring me back in the Fall). So they had to manufacture a series finale with a bit of a voiceover and some hastily thrown-together effects.

It didn't totally sit right with me. Maybe it's the fact that I'd rather see where the show would have gone past the cliffhanger. Maybe it's the rather ironic ending of "there-is-no-ending, just-new-beginnings" business. Whatever the case, it could have been handled a bit better.

Oh well. What's done is done. Now to gear up for the final episodes of Eli Stone and Kings.

Looks like my Fall TV viewing schedule is going to be a might empty.

Good news, everybody!

Futurama is coming back!

Now for the bad news. I don't have Comedy Central. That may have to change.

Wordcount Wednesday

I'm about two thirds of the way through Numb. That's a guess, not a certainty. This week, I added another 4,549 words, bringing the grand total to 52,310. This has me a bit nervous. Three years ago, I started writing a story for NaNoWriMo, one set in the same universe as this book. I made it to 50,000 words (barely) to win the month, but the story then petered out and I've never gone back to it.

Now I'm not saying that I'll be abandoning this story any time soon. But again, I wish I had made it further.

Worse, I know I'm not going to be making a lot of headway through the rest of June. Starting tomorrow, I'll be attending the Minnesota South District Convention in St. Paul for three days. A week after that, I'll be in Madison to perform a wedding for one of Jill's friends. And a week after that, it's a week at a cabin up north in Minnesota with my family.

Maybe I need to kick it into gear, see if I can't get this done before we head up north. We'll have to see.

There's a Zombie on your lawn!

Okay, so about this time last week, I was extremely depressed. My computer had to go into Best Buy for servicing. Bad timing, since The Sims 3 was coming out the very next day and I had been looking forward to playing that for a long time. But since the computer was acting so slow, I knew it had to be done. So off it went. For three or four days.

That posed quite a problem for me. I'm a gamer and I had no way of playing games. I would bring my laptop home from work but that was only good for checking e-mails and browsing the web. By Thursday, I was getting desperate. I had to play something.

Well, I knew that while my laptop could not handle the graphics load from The Sims 3, it could handle a casual game. And an on-line friend of mine had been playing this game, so much so that he posted a weird music video about it. I finally decided I had to check this game out for myself.

So I downloaded the free trial. Once the hour was up, I immediately bought the game. And even though the computer came back and I could finally play The Sims 3, I found I preferred to play this silly little casual game instead.

What is this remarkable game? Plants vs. Zombies.



Just a quick note: the above video is not the music video that enticed me to play the game. It's the official trailer, but you still get the idea.

Part of the reason why this game is such a blast is because it's so deceptively simple. Zombies are trying to invade your house. Your only line of defense are your plants. Set up your defenses as best you can and try to survive wave after wave of the shuffling undead.

But this is a PopCap game, and PopCap really knows how to make addictive games. With each successive levels, you get more and more plants to take out more and more powerful zombies. Part of the strategy is figuring out what plants you need to face what zombies. If you don't have the right plants, you're going to be facing a difficult battle.



Even though I've beaten the "adventure mode," I'm still playing the game obsessively because (and here's the true genius of this game), there are dozens of mini-games and puzzles to solve, each ridiculous, each hilarious.

So if you're a fan of casual games or just want to play this game to see the aforementioned music video, you can't go wrong with this one.

The Road

I don't get it. There, I said it.

I just got done reading The Road by Cormac McCarthy. I had heard great things about this book. What, exactly, I don't remember now. Maybe that should have told me something.

For those unfamiliar, McCarthy describes the journey of a man and his son through a post-apocalyptic wasteland. A horrible something has happened. What, we're never really told. There's a lot of ash everywhere and there were apparently a great number of fires (one city is described as being somewhat melted). The father and son must pick their way across the ruined landscape, scavenging for whatever they can find, trying to avoid the other survivors.

It turns out that most of humanity has become little better than animals. It sort of reminded me of Lord of the Flies only writ large and much more disgusting. I'd like to think that humanity would behave better after a massive disaster such as whatever happened, but I know my theology all too well to believe that. McCarthy's depiction of the breakdown of society and how people would behave is disturbing especially since it's so believable.

But that's as far as my comprehension ended. What was the overall theme of the book? Man's inhumanity to man? How fragile this thing was call "society" really is? How much a father is willing to sacrifice for his son?

I guess I'm no literati. The tale was intriguingly told. McCarthy's prose is, at times, poetic even when it's brutal. But this is the end of the road for me. And none too soon.

awesome awesome awesome awesome....

This is why I trust the folks at Bioware more than George Lucas when it comes to Star Wars.



Now I know I can't be trusted with MMORPGs. But I am salivating right now. Seriously. My keyboard is all wet and gross and I don't care.

Wordcount Wednesday

Why did I think this was a good idea again?

I didn't make as much progress as I hoped. I had unofficially set a goal of writing 2,000 words a day over the past week. I did not even come close.

So as of right now, on Numb, I've written a grand total of 47,761. That means that over the past seven days, I've written a new 5,772 words.

It's not all bad. While I may not have made a lot of forward progress, I rethought a few structural problems with the story that I'll have to fix on the rewrite.

Now I know that I promised a talk about what we can learn about writing from video games. Unfortunately, I have to put that off for a while. I apparently somehow managed to get 47-some-odd virii on my desktop computer, which means that I was unable to get the pictures/footage of the games I needed for the discussion. For some odd reason, today has reminded me of this.

Oh well. Maybe next week. Or some other time in the future. But tune in next week to see how much farther I can make it.

Darth Bane: Rule of Two

I know I've mentioned that I'm a Star Wars fan in the past. The interesting thing I've noticed over the past couple of years is that I've slowly lost interest in anything revolving around the two movie trilogies. I used to be an avid reader of the Star Wars novels, but after I finished the New Jedi Order series, I didn't really care what happened to Luke, Leia, Han, and the rest anymore. The same thing is true about the Clone Wars era. I can't be bothered. Yet the esoteric past of Star Wars, the vastly unexplored historical backstory of the Star Wars movies, well, sign me up for that!

Which brings me to this book, namely Darth Bane: Rule of Two by Drew Karpyshyn. This is a sequel to Darth Bane: Path of Destruction, a book I reviewed a little over two years ago. The story picks up where the previous book left off. Darth Bane and his newly acquired apprentice, Zannah, are trying to leave Ruusan in the wake of the war between the Jedi and the Sith. In the process of the story, Bane is encased by parasitic bugs that make him somewhat indistructible and he tries to figure out how to construct a Sith Holocron to preserve his teachings. Zannah, now technically Darth Zannah, goes along with her master's plans.

It didn't take me long to read this book, mostly because it's literary junk food. All filler and fun, no real heft to it. In some ways, the book wasn't all that good because the plot is kind of nebulous. What, exactly, is Bane trying to accomplish? We don't have the faintest clue. The characters too are a bit flimsy. At least with Sith Lords like Darth Sidious, we knew what he wanted. Galactic domination. That's a worthy goal of an evil Dark Sider, right? Yet Bane and Zannah's motivation is something of a mystery. Why did both of these peopel fall to the Dark Side? What are they trying to accomplish? Who knows.

I saw this afternoon that there will be a third Darth Bane novel. Maybe that will shed some light on what the "big picture" is for Bane and Zannah. If not, that's okay too. I'll still read it. Although, like with this one, I'll probably wait to get it from the library.

Roma Eterna

You know, on paper, Roma Eterna by Robert Silverberg should be my kind of book. It's counterfactual history, something that I really enjoy. And it's based around the Roman Empire, a subject that I'm fascinated by. And yet this book sapped my will to live. If it hadn't been for our home computer acting up, I might not have ever finished it.

It's an interesting premise: Silverberg posits a world where the Roman Empire never fell. It just kept on going. And yet the way Silverberg tried to tell this story fell flat in so many ways.

First of all, there's the structure. Rather than pick one time period and stick with it, Silverberg keeps jumping through time. The book is essentially a series of unconnected short stories, the only thing in common being the setting. Just when you're starting to care about the characters in the story, that story ends and they're never mentioned again. Or, if they are, it's an off-handed reference that really doesn't go anywhere.

Second, there's the repetitious nature of Silverberg's backstory. If he told me one more time that Maximilianus III subdued the barbarians once and for all, I'm pretty sure I would have torn my hair out. He did this time after time after time. And I kept thinking, I know, I know, you told me this ten pages ago!.

That's another problem. Lots of telling, not a lot of showing. It made for weak storytelling.

But the thing that really bothered me the most was Silverberg's point of historical departure. He posited that the reason why the Roman Empire never fell is because Christianity never existed. Now I've got theological problems with that that I won't go into here simply because those reasons aren't the reason why my suspended disbelief kept trying to unsuspend itself. I know that historians have suggested that Christianity brought about the fall of the Roman Empire. Given that possibility, it's within the realm of reason to believe that a lack of Christianity would mean a longer lasting Empire. The merits of the argument are beyond the scope of this book review and I leave that particular debate to people with more abbreviations behind their names than I.

No, there are two major reasons why I didn't like this point of departure. The first has to do with the idea of trajectory. Silverberg removes Christianity from the historical scene by having the Exodus fail. No Exodus, he reasons, no Isreal. No Isreal, no Jews. No Jews, no Christianity.

So that might work, but my problem here is that that leaves 1,200 years (at least) where things would be substantially different. No Exodus, no kingdom of Israel, right? Well, that leaves a power vacuum in the ancient world that would have to be filled. Who knows what might have arisen in the land of Canaan. A Philistine Empire? Would Egypt, who was the nominal overlords of the region at the time, maintained their hold, thus allowing them to resist the Assyrians and Babylonians? Who knows?

Silverberg's premise of removing the Exodus and only removing Christianity is far-fetched to the point of ridiculousness. It's entirely possible that by undoing the Exodus, the Roman Empire might never have arisen. The butterfly theory and all that.

The second reason why this point of departure is so ridiculous to me is because of what Silverberg does in his introduction. He has two Roman historians meet and discuss ancient history and one of them says something along these lines: "Well, what if that Moses guy had succeeded? Well, then, a religion may have arisen, based on resurrection, that would have appealed to Roman society and radically changed our society."

Um, excuse me? That's an awfully big intellectual leap for someone to make. Too big of one, if you ask me. Sure, Silverberg is trying to explain what's missing, but that could have been made pretty clear in short order rather than with the ham-fisted way he did.

According to Silverberg's biography, he's an award-winning author. Quite frankly, based on this book, I can't imagine why and I don't really care to learn. For me, if I want to see some good counterfactual storytelling in this same vein, I'll re-read Harry Turtledove's Agent of Byzantium. Much better and not quite so ludicrous.

Wordcount Wednesday

So I decided I need to add a feature to my blog here. We have the following regular features here at the Least Read Blog currently:

• The Christian Science Fiction/Fantasy Blog Tour (which happens monthly)
• Sermon podcasts (every Sunday or Monday, depending on when I can get to the editing unless I called in a guest preacher)
• Book reviews (whenever I finish reading a book)
• TV show musings (whenever I feel the need to ramble)
• Movie reviews (again, whenever I see one)
• Whatever else is rattling around in my brain (and there's not that much)
  

Only the first two items of this list happens regularly, and only one of them happens weekly. I decided I needed to add another regular feature, something I could do every week. I notice in that little banner up there that one of the things I'm supposed to talk about in this blog is writing. And sure, maybe I've done that in the blog tour posts, but I really don't talk a lot about my own writing.

That's part of the problem. I'm sporadic when it comes to my writing. I don't keep up with it like I should. I think I need some sort of accountability to keep me honest and keep me working.

So I've got two problems. And I think I came up one solution for both problems. Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you the latest feature of this blog: Wordcount Wednesdays. Every Wednesday, I will post the current word count of whatever it is I'm working on. If I'm rewriting or editing, I'll post my progress on that too. If I haven't done any work in the previous week, I'll admit to that freely and with great shame. Those who read my blog regularly, feel free to take me to task if I start to stray. I need a good kick in the rear every now and then.

Let's set a benchmark then, shall we? My current project is entitled Numb. It's Christian science fiction (I'm a glutton for punishment), set a few centuries in the future. The tag line for the story is this: A surgically modified assassin fights to save the woman he loves from his superiors. Now that I see it, it's not good enough. It really doesn't explain the assassin all that well. I'll need to work on that.

As of today, at 11:13 PM CST, I have written a grand total of 41,988 words in the first draft. I'll be honest, I'm not all that pleased. I had slated this one for about 75,000 words and I hoped to be done months ago. Hopefully I can make it through soon.

But there's one other thing. If I can, I'll throw in some rambling thoughts about writing in these updates as well. Ideas on craft, discoveries about my writing, that sort of thing.

We'll start things slowly this week. Let me introduce you to my writing partner ... Boba Fett.

That's right, I write with the bounty hunter himself, the unmodified clone of Jango Fett, the man so great that not even being eaten by a sarlacc could keep him down.

Sadly, Fett does not give me a lot of writing advice, especially since I wind up cramming him head first into my computer when it's time to write. In this case, Boba Fett is actually a flash drive.

I used to use one on a lanyard to store all my writing projects, but after my brother-in-law gave me this recently, I knew I had found a great addition to my writing routine.

Like I said, start light this week. Tune in next Wednesday for the next update. And maybe I'll shake loose some odd thoughts I've been having about what video games can teach us about writing.

Farenheit 451

The best books can always transcend their limitations and really speak to future generations. That's certainly true of Ray Bradbury's classic Farenheit 451. I was on the hunt for classic sci-fi and/or fantasy this afternoon at my local library when I stumbled across a copy. I had heard of the book before but never read it. And once again, I devoured a book in an afternoon. I'd like to think that Bradbury would approve.

For those unfamiliar with the story, Guy Montag is a fireman. Only he doesn't put out fires. Instead, he starts them. In this future world that Bradbury has constructed, it's illegal to read books. If you're caught with them, the firemen come and burn them ... along with your house. Guy doesn't really think about what he's doing until he meets a teenage girl named Clarisse. She starts opening his mind to the world around him by asking some seemingly innocent questions. But soon Guy is taking a good hard look at the world around him and he's not liking what he sees. He wants more.

Not all of Bradbury's ideas translate that well into the modern age. Some of his depictions seem a bit quaint (for example, Montag at one point declares that the U.S. has won two atomic wars since 1990). And yet a lot of what he depicted is coming true. Montag's world is one of rampant consumerism and materialism. Montag's wife, their friends and neighbors, they're all plugged into watching "televisor" screens that take up entire walls. There's no real new thought, no appreciate for the classics. Keep the people entertained and whatever you do, don't let them think for themselves! It's frightening how close to modern society Bradbury hits.

Single Sashimi

Venus Chau is my kind of gal.

She's the heroine of Single Sashimi by Camy Tang, the "last" book in the Sushi Series (more on why I put that in quotes in a bit). Venus is a gamer and works in the game industry. She is a no-nonsense, tough as nails individual and has to be in a male dominated workplace. She likes stilleto heels because it allows her to at least meet the men eye-to-eye if not look down on them. She is quick to take charge and speak her mind.

And Venus has big plans. She and a friend are working on a game development tool called the Spiderweb that could revolutionize the game design industry. But her life starts to go awry when she's passed over for a promotion at her job. At the same time, her old boss, Drake Yu, contacts her and offers her a position at his sister's start-up, an MMO company geared for families. Everything seems to be falling into place but then Venus's life starts to spiral out of control. Could it be that God is trying to tell her something?

Like I said, I loved Venus. Probably the gamer in me. Heaven knows I'd probably be scared to death of her if I met her in real life. I'd be the timid guy in the corner wishing he had the courage to go up and speak to her (that is, if I weren't married already. Love you, Jill!). But I think that's why I enjoyed reading about Venus. She was tough but vulnerable at the same time.

The same can't be said for Drake Yu, though. He's not quite as fleshed out as the other men in the Sushi Series. At least, he didn't seem to be that way to me.

The plot for this book also wasn't quite as twisty as the previous books (especially Only Uni, which I think is my favorite out of the series). That's not a complaint necessarily. Even though I saw the big crisis coming, when it happened, I was riveted watching the drama unfold. And I was cheering as the "bad guys" got nailed in the end. So the story definitely kept me riveted, so much so that I was up until about two in the morning yesterday to finish the book.

There are really only two complaints that I have about the book and they both revolve around Venus's family. First there's her cousins. Part of what I enjoyed about the other books in the Sushi Series is how visible the other cousins were. They showed up constantly to add drama or try to help. They largely disappeared through the middle of Single Sashimi. Now that's certainly understandable due to their own dramas, but I missed them.

The other revolves around Grandma, the indomitable force of nature that blew through the first two books. In Sushi for One and Only Uni, Grandma was devious, conniving, and ... well, a great antagonist for the girls. In Single Sashimi, she's a bit too tame. I think that's because Venus is so similar to Grandma, but it seems like the old lady got defanged somewhere between book two and three. We find out a potential reason why at the very end of the book, and when I read what had happened, I was like, "You've got to be kidding me! That happened? Why couldn't I see that?" I think it's a missed opportunity.

That said, I'm kind of sad that this is the "final" book in the series, seeing as there's one more cousin to go. But maybe I can take heart. I recently popped by Camy Tang's website and saw that if you sign up for her e-mail newsletter, you'll receive Weddings and Wasabi, a novella about Jenn Chau, the fourth and final cousin.

I know I'm signing up as soon as I'm done with this review. Because I have to find out what's up with the goat in the backyard.

Terminator Salvation

Even though critics have been ripping it apart (sometimes quite viciously), I had to see Terminator Salvation for myself. And I have to say, I see what they mean.

This movie wasn't all that good. Oh, sure, you've got the special effects, the bang-em-up, blow-em-up spectacular that every summer blockbuster needs. But really, that's all there is here. Lots of "fun" effects, including a nude "governor" at one point that made me chuckle (and wonder if the T-800 prototype was on steroids).

A lot of critics have panned the film saying that it had no heart, no emotional connection to or between the characters. And that's certainly true. There's nothing, not a single warm moment to be had. Even when John Connor met Kyle Reese for the very first time, there was some dull surprise but that was about it. You'd think that finally meeting dear old dad would be ... well, you know, emotional or something.

But the movie didn't just suffer from a lack of heart. It also suffered from a lack of brains as well. Someone please tell me how Skynet knew about Kyle Reese? I mean, seriously. How did they find out? Sarah Connor didn't exactly make this public knowledge. So how did Skynet find out? How did the computer know that by kidnaping Kyle, it would be able to get its hands on John Connor?

Allow me to play Monday morning quarterback for a moment. I think it would have been a lot more satisfying to see a movie about the early resistance where John Connor doesn't want to embrace his destiny. He sees the resistance under the able control of Michael Ironside's character and thinks that maybe Mom was wrong. And then something happens and John has to take control, scoring a decisive first victory against Skynet. The end of the movie could revolve around Skynet realizing that it had a tremendous adversary in John Connor and gearing up to stop him (but no time travel yet). Much more emotional. Much more interesting.

As it is, this movie is just a bunch of sound and fury, signifying nothing. Lots of great ILM effects but that's about it. I have a friendly suggestion for the production team. Bring the writing crew from The Sarah Connor Chronicles to help you write the inevitable sequel. I hear they're not doing anything right now. More's the pity.

By Darkness Hid

Holy cow! I am in awe right now of Jill Williamson's phenomenal book, By Darkness Hid. Let me put it to you this way. I'm a fast reader. I always have been. And how fast I read is directly proportional to how much I enjoy what I'm reading. I do believe I devoured this 490 page book in approximately 24 hours. When I woke up this morning (or rather, was woken up by my son. At 5:30 in the morning), I really wasn't all that upset because it meant I could finish reading this book!

The story centers around two young people. One is Achan Cham. Achan is a stray, worse than a slave, forced to work in the kitchens of a spoiled crown prince. The other is Vrell Sparrow, supposedly another stray but really a young woman in hiding because she doesn't want to marry the aforementioned spoiled crown prince. Both Achan and Vrell are adept at bloodvoicing. They can read other people's thoughts. They can project their own to others. And Achan is probably the most powerful bloodvoicer to come along in a generation.

Yet there's a fair bit of intrigue that both must face. Achan is selected by a knight named Sir Gavin to train as his squire (although it's illegal for strays to do so). And Vrell is taken from her hiding place to be the apprentice of a man named Macoun Hadar. While you know that these two will eventually cross paths, the how and why is simply breathtaking.

Can you tell I loved this book? Absolutely adored it. Williamson's characterizations are incredible. Your heart simply goes out to Achan as he is abused as a stray. You want Vrell to be able to go home to be with her family and marry the man she truly loves. Personally, I want to punch spoiled Prince Gidon in the face. Repeatedly.

The world Williamson created is vibrant and fun. The bloodvoicing is fantastic as well, especially as Achan discovers his talent for it. And the plot was great. I did see the surprise coming ... well, kind of. I had a sneaking suspicion what Sir Gavin was up to, but I didn't realize the full extent until the trap was sprung.

Probably the only gripe I have is that the sequel isn't in my hands already so I can read it. In the final author's note, Williamson reveals that she's working on it, To Darkness Fled. All I can say is, Jill Williamson, get cracking!

The Dark Man

I first heard about The Dark Man by Mac Schooley from Jeff Gerke, the publisher of Marcher Lord Press. This past September, I interviewed Jeff for this blog and he told me about this book he got about a master of disguises who is tormented by a talking puzzle box. Jeff was extremely excited about the story so it came as little surprise to me when I saw that this book was part of Marcher Lord's second list.

The story itself is set in the not-so-distant future. Christianity has been outlawed in the United States. So the Church has gone underground, meeting where they can when they can. But they have to be extremely cautious. The government is hunting them down and sending them to reclamation centers. And one of the best agents in the business is Charles Graves.

Charles is the aforementioned master of disguise. He can become just about anyone, allowing him to infiltrate Christian cells to bring them down. And yes, he really is tormented by someone he calls "the dark man," an entity that speaks to him primarily through a wooden puzzle box his grandfather made.

Charles and one of his colleagues, a man named Farris (and pronounced Fah-reese), are given a plum assignment: they're to track down and capture one of the last pastors in Texas, a man named James Cleveland. But things go awry for Charles in the middle of the hunt. Suddenly he finds himself in the middle of a crazy adventure that sets his former allies against him. Can Charles survive and save the ones he loves? And can he find out who he really is deep, deep down?

I enjoyed this book, mostly because of Schooley's crackling wit. While the subject matter is familiar (there are plenty of stories about future persecutions out there. I'm even writing one myself right now), Schooley's voice really sings throughout the book. The world he has created is gritty and dirty, sort of what you would expect of a bleak dystopia. And you really do feel for Charles and James as they grapple with the reality they're in.

That said, there were a few things that I didn't like. Schooley presents Charles as being somewhat crazy. When we're in Charles's point of view, we often see him arguing with himself or the dark man about what his next course of action should be. That's a great thing, but the problem is, Schooley utilizes the same method for Julia (Charles's lady friend) and Cotton (Charles's dad). The lessened the impact of when he did it for Charles.

My other complaint was the way that two of the subplots seemed sort of tacked on. The mystery surrounding Charles's brother, Stephen, didn't seem to fit in all that well and when it was finally resolved, I was left a little disappointed. The other plot, which I can't really go into here because it would involve some big spoilers, really felt tacked on. There didn't seem to be any references to it through most of the book. Then, suddenly, toward the end, extra characters pop out of nowhere and the story suddenly revolves around them and what they're trying to do. If they had been mentioned earlier in the book, it may not have been so jarring.

But this is still a great debut novel and I'm certainly looking forward to Schooley's future endeavors.