Black, by Ted Dekker (BOOK REVIEW)

 

"The point is, we were created to love beauty. We love beauty because Elyon loves beauty. We love song because Elyon loves song. We love love because Elyon loves love. And we love to be loved because Eylon loves to be loved. In all these ways we are like Elyon. In one way or another, everything we do is tied to this unfolding story of love between us and Elyon."

Summary─୨ৎ────────୨ৎ────────୨ৎ

Fleeing his assailants through deserted alleyways, Thomas Hunter narrowly escapes to the roof of a building. Then a silent bullet from the night clips his head...and his world goes black.

From the blackness comes an amazing reality of another world-a world where evil is contained. A world where Thomas Hunter is in love with a beautiful woman. Then he remembers the dream of the chase as he reaches to touch the blood on his head.

Where does the dream end and reality begin? Every time he falls asleep in one world, he awakes in the other-both facing catastrophic disaster. Thomas is being pushed beyond his limits...even beyond the limits of space and time.
Some say the world hangs in the balance of every choice we make. Now the fate of two worlds hangs in the balance of one man's choice.

Review──୨ৎ────────୨ৎ────────୨ৎ

"God wasn't a lamb or a lion or a boy. He was all of them if he chose to be. Or none of them. They were metaphors for the truth. The truth. One truth. Two sides of one truth. Lion and lamb."

I don't think I've ever read a Christian Fantasy, so this was a very interesting experience. This was one of those books, where I feel like it had so much potential, but I'm not exactly sure why I didn't like it more. 

The plot to this book was unlike anything I've ever read. It was very intriguing and original. The way that Ted Dekker intertwined these two realities that he implied wasn't my favorite. It felt like the mmc was constantly falling asleep and waking up. So, I think one of my reasons for not really liking this book, was because of the pacing. It was interesting at the beginning, and dragged the rest of the book, until the last 5 pages. I found myself very bored at times, and not very excited to continuing reading again. 

Although the plot, in my opinion, wasn't at it's fullest potential, there were some things that I really like about this book. The first thing is the analogies that Ted Dekker used. Although some of the plot fell flat for me, there were a lot of parts that I loved. So many different factors to this story had a much deeper meaning. I loved the way that Ted Dekker made this a Christian fantasy. It wasn't preachy, or smack-dab-in-your-face; it was more like a parable. I still think of a lot of those parts, that clicked with a meaning beneath the surface, all the time. My thoughts refer to a few beautiful scenes in this book, quite often. Ted Dekker did an amazing job with that part of the book. If an author can write a book with such powerful scenes, that the reader is forever imprinted with, that is a very talented author.

The main character, Thomas was interesting. His character definitely represented and reflected a lot of humanity, with all of the faults. So I didn't really like him. But his character in this book, makes a lot of room in the rest of the series for really good character development. I liked the way that Ted Dekker already began that process at the end of this book, too. 

This was a unique book. Dekker intertwined our modern world, fantasy, Christian analogies, politics, world-disaster and a little bit of romance. It's good to read books like this, that you don't fully like, but love for the parts that were just so good. This book holds its own and it has a lot of heart put into it. 

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I give this book a 6.5 out of 10 and recommend it to ages 14+

Happy Reading!

-Ariana :)