New review

Another review for STG at fantasy book critic. Yay.

Not my strongest review, and a bit rambling and hard to follow, but over all Mahir thinks I wrote a good book that could be better. A true statement of just about everything, isn't it? (And at 'goodreads' he rated it four out of five stars.) But to be candid, I had a lot to say and STG was the best book I could have said them in at the time I wrote it.

I was also happy to see that the critic hit on several of the things I wanted to say in the book (themes....ooohh no, literaryness). STG is a story about flawed people making choices. It's about living with those choices and realizing that the choices you make don't have to define you for the rest of time. It's about relationships, it's about faith, and it's about doing what you think needs to be done, even if you know the outcome won't be in your best interest. (think 'cowboying-up')

Several of the critics also picked out the stylistic components that I was shooting for; noirish, epic themes on a personl level.

This has also been a criticism; 'angels and demons? Where's Armageddon, why such a 'small' book?'

My answer to the smallishness was that most of us make personal decisions that in the grand scheme of things are pretty small scale, they don't change the whole world, most people don't even know we have made them. But that doesn't make them unimportant. In fact the small decisions we make everyday, to show humanity, to do the right things, to be a positive and uplifting influence- rather than making the selfish or thoughtless choices, are the decisions that I think are the most important of all.

If this doesn't make sense, I suggest you read the 'Screwtape Letters' from CS Lewis, then get back to me.