NEW SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY REVIEWS
Reviews Of Recently Published Science Fiction And Fantasy Books
Reviewer: Forrest Schultz schultz_forrest@yahoo.com 770-583-3258
Blog Address: http://newsciencefictionandfantasyreviews.blogspot.com
August 29, 2011
Let Your Light Shine !!!
A Review of
Peter J. Dudek Forsaken Kingdom: City of Prophecy (Alliance, Ohio: Carnation City Press, 2011)
311pp ISBN: 978-0-615-23201-0
Reviewer: Forrest W. Schultz
Peter Dudek enjoys reading Tolkien, his model for the writing of his own fantasy stories. If you liked The Lord of the Rings you will also like City of Prophecy, Dudek's debut novel and the first book of his Forsaken Kingdom series about the world of Arvalast.
I am a fan of Tolkien and I like Dudek's story but am dissatisfied with the title for its failure to indicate the light-versus-darkness conflict, which constitutes the prominent motif of the story. This prominence soon becomes apparent to the reader of the story, and is also indicated by the book's jacket: the front cover displays a picture of the Illumina and the rear jacket blurb begins with these words in large bold face type -- The days have grown dark.
This blurb -- which is an excellent synopsis of the story, by the way -- tells us that these Illumina are "phials of holy, pure light that Arvalast citizens carry with them". The blurb and the story itself both show that darkness encroaches ever more upon the land as the light in the Illuminas grows dimmer as the people's faith in their righteous King grows ever weaker. The light in a man's Illumina indicates the strength of the spiritual light in his heart and also serves as a potent physical weapon against demonic-like attackers. If you think a laser is powerful, then you need to learn about what a white-hot Illumina can do, which you will find out when you read the story!
The light-versus-darkness conflict is especially dramatic in the lives of Woodend Governor Willerdon and his wife and his son and his daughter, who are four of the main characters in the book. And their spiritual struggles -- both in their hearts and their Illuminas -- are crucial to the unfolding of the story. And the spiritual conflicts in the other characters are also depicted in terms of the battle of light against darkness.
The reason the Kingdom has become forsaken is because the darkness has been more and more overpowering the light. And the prophecy refers to great spiritual warriors who will soon begin arriving on the scene to turn the tide of battle against the darkness and toward a victory for the light.
This apocalyptic battle will NOT be won until the citizens proclaim and follow this motto: LET YOUR LIGHT SHINE!!
The next book in this series, entitled Harrowing Memories is expected to be published soon.
Information on Peter Dudek and his novels is found on his website, www.forsakenkingdom.net.
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