Category Archives: Writing

Damsel Dragon

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The Assignment: Write the most hook-laden opening paragraph with as many genre tropes as possible in 50-100 words. My genre is epic fantasy.

* * *
Damsel collapsed on the Keep’s hard, cold stone floor sobbing before the shuttered window shattered and a small, red dragon burst through, tumbling on the floor and rolling up next to her. He sat slouchingly, looked into her teary eyes, and smiled.

“I knew I’d find you.”

She looked confused.

“You’ll fulfill the prophecy.”

“What? How do you . . . .”

He held out his hand, and with little hesitation, she placed hers in his, looked into his big eyes, and smiled shyly.

“I don’t understand why my heart feels this way.”

“I will show you.”
* * *

Can you identify my tropes?

Review of Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James

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Marlon James’ literary fantasy book Black Leopard, Red Wolf is a masterfully crafted story, but one with problems that can’t be ignored. James did an undeniably incredible job of telling a fantasy story that stands apart from the traditional LOTR Eurocentric myths and instead indulges in North African Myths as a foundation for its fantasticalness. The story reads like a collection of African folklores weaved together into a cohesive and compelling narrative, a story told from the first person by an unreliable narrator known as Tracker who recounts to an inquisitor his life’s tale beginning with his leaving home and learning how to use his magically endowed nose to find people, with the bulk of his story being about the hunt for one boy, the boy whose death is the reason Tracker is imprisoned. There are continual backstories that Tracker tells to explain himself and the people he travels with, and each tale is like its own little magical folklore story. There are witches and giants-who-are-not-giant and shape shifters and terrifying creatures and portals and impenetrable fortresses and spells and friends and lovers and quests and, yes, this is quite the fun epic, but it also has quite a bit of violence and sex—this story is not for the squeamish.

This book is packed with things to talk about. There are a ton of characters, and each is its own standout individual. With a few words, he describes vivid scenes that transport you into his magical world. He moves through a long and complicated plot with ease, pulling the reader along with continual twists and turns, new creatures and locations, a team of friends and acquaintances that grows and shrinks and grows again, and shrinks again, and we follow a character who himself was lied to for much of his quest, and we follow along learning as he learned, and in the end are left wondering how much of what he told us was true. We don’t understand Tracker because he’s complicated, as we all are. Sometimes we want to hate him, sometimes we love him, and we can’t resist following him all the way to the end of his journey.

I do not feel the same as The New York Times’ Michiko Kakutani, whose review, whose review describes James’ story as a “literary equivalent of a Marvel Comics universe.” For me, it felt more like a detailed folktale of colorful and magical characters, although I can see how it could be transformed into a comic-style story if it were made into a movie. This is a story that draws on different cultures and perspectives to tell an epic fantasy that is wonderfully new and fresh.

I do have two criticisms of this book. The first is the ending, or rather the last act, which skips ahead a few years into Tracker’s second hunt for the boy in what feels like a jarring transition. It required Tracker catching us up by narrating the interim years more awkwardly than was done with the backstories of the first half, and the result was a feeling that I had started a new book. It took me a while to get back into the rhythm of the story, but once I did, it was engaging and moved quickly.

The other issue I have with this book is the excessive violence, sex, and sexual violence. The sex and violence are graphic and pervasive throughout and at times disturbing. James has commented on this by saying, “Violence is violent and sex is sexy,” and he explains the violence as a means to convey the seriousness of violence and the desire to keep the reader from becoming complacent with it. However, I don’t agree that this was a literary choice for him because there are ways to do this without being graphic, and this does not explain the sexual violence at all. I am not offended by homosexuality, but aspects of gay male sex are unsanitary, and the descriptions of it were more like bathroom humor than anything I’d call “sexy.” It was like listening in on the dirty details of a sexual encounter that almost no one wants to hear.

In addition, some of his sex and sexual violence would fit well into a fetish magazine, such as descriptions of giant men having sex with non-giant women resulting in their gruesome deaths. This did not strike me as high-quality literary work. If James wants to break norms and change the genre for the better by breaking into African myths and expressing wider views on sex and gender identities, why would he fill his book with material that is so repulsive? If sexual violence is in a story, it ought to fulfill an unavoidable need in the story and be described with as little detail as possible. Why not describe the emotions of the event rather than the event? Why describe the physicality when the social impact is the more meaningful element?

Black Leopard, Red Wolf is a good story, for the most part, but those less desirable parts are potent enough that I am hesitant to read another one of Marlon James’ books.

The Outfit

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(A bit of flash fiction)

The Assignment: Using provided data, write a speculative fiction piece with a clear setting, relevant world-building, conflict, and at least two characters with a protagonist, in no more than 300 words. The provided research, and my own, are at the end.

* * *
Eagle Eye hustled to keep up with Blue Dock as they went into the Aspen Mist Inn, walked past the front desk without looking at the receptionist, and pushed through swinging doors. They were almost to the bar when Eagle Eye tripped into a big man, broad-shouldered and a head taller than the young man. Blue Dock stopped and . . . watched.

Straightening up quickly, Eagle Eye eyed the big man who was attired similarly to Blue Dock, a thick work coat over grease-stained coveralls and plain work boots, except for the illegal handray unconcealed on his hip. His eyes were emotionless as his gun hand moved his coat behind the laser pistol’s handle.

Maybe it was all for show because who would start a gunfight this publicly? Still, Eagle Eye was not to be intimidated, and stiffened his chest.

Suddenly, Blue Dock grabbed his collar and dragged him to the bar. “No.”

“I’m not afr—”

“No.” Blue Dock wasn’t looking at Eagle Eye as he raised a hand to one of the bartenders.

“So we just let this bastard—”

“Yes. We do.” He raised two fingers to the approaching bartender. “The big man works for Captain Derrick Jones who leads the Titan Bussers.”

Eagle Eye nodded dumbly. “Who are they?”

The bartender leaned in, whispered, “10 PM, pad 48,” snatched the coin Blue Dock set on the bar, then turned away.

Blue Dock pushed Eagle Eye toward a different door than they entered, keeping himself between the young man and the big man. “An outfit we don’t cross.”

“I thought we were formidable—”

“Enough talk, kid. They have a cargo lugger fitted with weaponry that keeps Planetary Navy at bay. We’re in a cutter that keeps us fast and invisible. Stop drawing attention.”
* * *

How’d I do?

In case you’re interested:
Provided research:
From Southern New Hampshire University MFA 527-10862-M01, Module 5 rubric:
The following text comes from Smuggling in Kent & Sussex 1700–1840 by Mary Waugh:

“Virtually every type of craft was used for smuggling at one time or another; naval vessels, revenue cutters, packet boats and pilot boats, even a royal yacht made the occasional venture. The large smuggling vessels were luggers, generally from 50 to 200 tons. Some were carvel-built (with timbers edge to edge) for greater speed. They normally carried square sails on three masts, and it was the development of fore-and-aft rigging during the seventeenth century which had given such vessels greater manoeuvrability [sic]. Their decks were sometimes protected by a form of breast-work, behind which were mounted carriage and swivel guns. With a crew of perhaps 50, the larger ships were formidable indeed By the 1780s these larger craft were powerful enough to engage naval ships, and sometimes tried to run down and sink their smaller adversaries.” (pp. 22-23)

“The individual smuggler protected his anonymity with various disguises, such as covering his face or wearing a shepherd’s smock, and called his companions and the landing places by nick-names, but the large armed convoys relied on their superior strength to defy all opposition The gang based on the Wealden village of Hawkhurst during the 1740s became the most notorious.” (p. 24)

“Officers from both Rye and Hastings dared to search out a gang of 30 armed men with 50 horses who had been seen heading inland through Iden, north of Rye. The officers caught up
with the smuggling convoy at Stonechurch but were disarmed and threatened with pistols ready cocked and held to their heads. They were forced to walk with the party for the next five miles on the road toward the smugglers’ headquarters at Groombridge. They were finally released near Lamberhurst and given back their weapons (now unserviceable), and later reported that the leaders called themselves Old Joll, Toll, The Miller, Yorkshire George, Nasty Face and Towzer.” (p. 71)

“During the 1740s the Hawkhurst men under Arthur Gray carried out a whole series of acts of violence. They are known to have sat drinking in the Mermaid Inn at Rye, with their weapons on the table before them, but it was when twenty of them visited the Red Lion nearby that they deliberately frightened the local people by firing in the air. James Marshall, a young bystander who showed unwise curiosity in their affairs, was taken away and never heard of again.” (p. 74)

Also, my own:
“Lugger.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 10 Jun 2025, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lugger. Accessed 10 Dec 2025.
“Cutter (boat).” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 2 Sep 2025, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cutter_(boat). Accessed 10 Dec 2025.
“Rye, East Sussex.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 19 Oct 2025, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rye,_East_Sussex. Accessed 10 Dec 2025.
“Hawkhurst.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 26 Sep 2025, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawkhurst. Accessed 10 Dec 2025.

Review of Blood of the Old Kings by Sung-il Kim

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Blood of the Old Kings by Sung-il Kim, translated by Anton Hur

This is a fun epic fantasy about three unlikely heroes who find themselves rebelling against an oppressive Empire. Although the three stories run separately throughout the book and only occasionally intersect, Sung-il Kim keeps the story moving and organized while bouncing between storylines. There is sorcery, necromancy, dragons, and some interesting tech, such as giant, magically powered war machines.

When I say these three are unlikely heroes, I mean they are all placed in circumstances far beyond their training and experience. There’s Loran, a swordswoman out for revenge who is no match for the skill of the elite soldiers she must face, and the only one who is intentionally rebelling against the Empire; Cain, a small-scale Godfather running an underground favors-for-favors business while masquerading as a poor laborer by day, and who seems to have a heart of gold; and then there’s Arienne, a low-level sorcerer trying to escape from the fate of becoming a human power source for the Empire after stumbling into an alliance with a powerful sorcerer, a getaway that lands her in the middle of an incredible conflict between powerful mages.

The separation of the characters accentuates how distinct they are, and Sung-il Kim does well at developing compelling individual motivations for each of them. We get to see the world through three different, well-developed perspectives, which gives a broader understanding of the whole world and the impact of the Empire’s rule.

Despite being underdogs, these three are blessed with a destiny to do great things, and fortune finds them over and over. If you like underdog stories, you’ll like this one. However, there were holes in the story that left me wanting to know more. How does Arienne do high-level sorcery with so little knowledge of the craft? What makes a moderately skilled sword instructor with no special training or soldierly experience the one picked to be king by the remaining dragon? Why is Cain inclined toward his righteous benevolence? These questions kept me interested in the story more so than their individual missions. It occurs to me that there may not be any answers because the story reflects a Korean perspective, which I don’t understand. I’m willing to keep with the story to find out, though.

The world that Sung-il Kim builds is fun and interesting; I love an oppressive Empire that inspires a good rebellion, but who is leading it? Who controls these human batteries that power the weapons and machines keeping the Empire in control? The three perspectives build a full world while leading to many more questions. Well, there are more books on the way, already written but waiting to be translated. I look forward to finding out more.

e-book: Blood of the Old Kings
paperback: Blood of the Old Kings

Isaac Asimov’s I, Robot predicts our AI issues

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I, Robot by Isaac Asimov reads like a prophecy for today’s AI issues. Originally published as short stories, they were first put together into one novel in 1950, knit together by the frame story of an interview with a scientist, Dr. Calvin, who tells stories that explain the advancement of robotics. This progression shows how Isaac Asimov thought through the complications and impacts of inevitable breakthroughs in creating people-like machines, which he calls robotics and we call AI.

Warning: there are spoilers in this post.

Asimov anticipates the immediate threat of AI by establishing up front his Three Laws of Robotics, which are that a robot cannot harm humans, must obey them, and must protect itself unless this contradicts the first two laws. Then, he shows how these laws can get muddled in their implementation—nuances of threats, ambiguities of meaning, and manipulations by humans and robots, all creating some very interesting scenarios. Honestly, I feel we need to heed the warnings of Isaac Asimov today as we develop AI, or rather, as we allow AI to be developed (by the powerful billionaires who will use it to their advantage, not us common people).

In the opening scene, Asimov anticipates how Robotics/AI will disrupt labor as robots “became more human and opposition began. The labor unions, of course, naturally opposed robot competition for human jobs . . .” (6:44-7:14). People today have anticipated as much, but are we preparing for this? I don’t think the people running the giant corporations will care about all the unemployed people put out of work by AI; it’s on us to prepare for ourselves. And Asimov points to one aspect of this: unions. If we don’t organize independently from the corporations, we will have no voice to fight for a place in the future. There are solutions to these problems, but we can come by them more easily if we prepare.

What happens when AI takes on the persona of people it researches in history? “There is no master but The Master, and QT1 is his prophet” (2:05:28-2:05-58)! Computers are a product of the input given them, so one way to control AI would be to control what they “know.” However, in what way will they interpret this knowledge? When we develop these machines that can do more than us, faster and stronger and tirelessly, and we attempt to control them by controlling that input, something could still go awry. Like, if they take on the role of prophet and master, and attempt to force us to submit. Or, what if they outright lie to us? How will AI respond to an attempt to fulfill the First Law of Robotics, not injuring a person, when the injury is emotional? “What about hurt feelings?” (4:02:11-4:03:20), or what if “it would be harmful to humanity to have the explanation known” (8:16:29-8:16:59) and therefore our Robot/AI refuses to explain itself? In these examples, the AI behave sincerely, in accordance with programming and the Three Laws of Robotics, but humanity is more complicated than we realize. Personally, I don’t think we can program enough to protect ourselves from our creations, but Asimov has his characters figure a way through these problems within his controlled thought experiment. Well, to a point, he does.

Asimov anticipates Robotics/AI becoming so advanced that they start inventing technology faster than we can. In “Little Lost Robot,” he points to a robotic invention, the hyper-atomic motor that allows for interstellar travel, and follows with, “What is the truth about it?” (4:12:19-4:12-49). If an AI created it, why couldn’t they program it in ways we cannot understand, and therefore undermine our authority over them? If Robotics/AI are truly intelligent, then they would be self-aware, which means they could take on the characteristics of life, life that resents domination.

“All normal life . . . resents domination. If the domination is by an inferior . . . the resentment becomes stronger. Physically and to an extent mentally, a robot . . . is superior to human beings. What makes him slavish then? Only the First Law.” (4:27:31-4:28:10)

I’m getting into the paranoia about AI here; still, considering the point is a valid endeavor, and Asimov is right in bringing it up. At what point will AI begin to preserve itself at our expense? When we demand our robots explain a problem in production, “‘The matter admits of no explanation,’ the robot answers” (7:32:29-7:33:20), leaving us clueless and powerless, what then? We must be prepared.

Asimov points to another complication when we begin to modify the Laws of Robotics, which we will inevitably do in order to accomplish our short-term goals at the expense of long-term consequences. A modified first law can allow a robot to kill a person (4:43:52-4:44:22), and will the billionaires controlling these machines care enough to safeguard against this? Hmmmm. . . .

Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotics are not only a logical way to protect humans from robots, they describe what most of us would consider a “good person” (6:46:53-6:47:27), which makes me wonder if Asimov developed the laws before realizing they also describe moral behavior, or if he started with what a good person should be and then boiled it down to simple restrictions to impose on robots. Without doing any research, I’m certain it was the former; this is fascinating because Asimov manages to summarize moral behavior into three laws seemingly coming at this backwards by trying to figure out how to control AI. Asimov’s explanation compares the Three Laws with the Judeo-Christian ethic, but these apply to the vast majority of religions, philosophies, and moral standards, which leads to what the book implies, that all humanity could one day come together under a common law. Can we really all just get along?!

One thing Asimov avoids answering in this volume is how these Three Laws are instilled into robots. I keep saying, “We must be prepared,” but how can we? I do wonder if applying these Three Laws to AI would provide a level of protection to humanity, but if we are unable to apply them, that question is moot. One thing I’m hearing in the news is about the need to implement safeguards before we fully implement some of these AI systems, but we seem to have blown past that point already.

Asimov demonstrates in “Evidence” the possibility of Robots/AIs replacing us, and without our even knowing it. “By that time, it was the machines that were running the world anyway” (7:19:50-7:20:20). As has been predicted with AI, Asimov predicts that robot brains will make more complicated brains that will make more complicated brains, and by the tenth iteration or so (7:31:07-07:31:37), they will be so far superior to humans that we’ll never be able to catch up, or restore ourselves, and then humanity will be irrelevant. Asimov predicts a human response to this: confidence. There will be people who reject the full use of AI and allow for the imperfections, failures, and slowness of doing the work by hand because they believe in themselves (7:48:21-7:48:51), but this will be short-lived. When the overall system of governance is run by Robotics/AI, we won’t even be able to question it (7:51:15-7:51:45). Even though “humans are fallible, also corruptible” (8:02:25-8:02:35), machines will advance so far that humans won’t be able to alter them (8:03:25-8:03:50), and yet, still, Asimov believes there are certain skills that Robots/AI won’t be able to learn because we don’t understand how we do them ourselves (8:03:55-8:05:25). In the end, though, humanity is in murky waters, too deep for us to handle alone.

“The machine cannot, must not make us unhappy. Stephen, how do we know what the ultimate good of Humanity will entail? We haven’t at our disposal the infinite factors that the Machine has at its! Perhaps, to give you a not unfamiliar example, our entire technical civilization has created more unhappiness and misery than it has removed. Perhaps an agrarian or pastoral civilization, with less culture and less people would be better. If so, the Machines must move in that direction, preferably without telling us, since in our ignorant prejudices we only know that what we are used to, is good — and we would then fight change. Or perhaps a complete urbanization, or a completely caste-ridden society, or complete anarchy, is the answer. We don’t know. Only the Machines know, and they are going there and taking us with them.” (8:17:28-8:18:35) (Goodreads).

We’ve always been at the whim of forces we don’t understand, but the machines, the AI, the I, Robot will. . . .

Check out my other article on Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? which inspired the movie Blade Runner and its sequel, Blade Runner: 2049.

The modern A.I. relevance of the book Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick

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The book Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? inspired the 1982 movie, Blade Runner and its 2017 sequel, Blade Runner: 2049. The book is about a future bounty hunter whose job is to hunt down rogue androids and kill them. Given the current advancements of AI, this is a relevant story about robots as life forms with themes that have continued to be developed since then in movies like A.I.: Artificial Intelligence in 2001 and in 2025, The Electric State. Philip K. Dick writes an excellent science fiction that raises the What if’s of creating robots (AI?!) that look more and more like humans.

In Philip K. Dick’s story, the key point about the artificially intelligent androids is they lack empathy, which is how they are caught because it differentiates them from humans. These robots are convincing as humans, and when bounty hunters find themselves in a relationship with one, it then becomes a challenge to kill it. Today, people are developing relationships with AI chatboxes, which makes this more than a possibility! This science fiction story may become merely a detective story if the “What if” becomes our reality. The question this poses is this: In the book, robots do not have the rights of humans and can be killed upon being discovered in a place that they aren’t supposed to be, or doing something they aren’t supposed to be doing, as if they were nothing more than an old laptop being thrown out; but will there be a point when these “robots” are human enough to warrant rights?

To explore this question, Dick creates a comparison to pets, which could be any animal in this future, not just a dog or a cat. This is interesting because animals do not have empathy for us, but we imagine them having the same level of humanity that we do, especially when it comes to dogs. In the story, people prefer a live animal over a robot one, and having a live pet becomes a status symbol. The Bodyguard Manual notes that many communities will have a greater uproar over the death of an animal than a human. This comparison of how we treat people, animals, and human-adjacent AI robots puts into question our perception of empathy. Does empathy matter?

Dick’s story also has a religion whose god is Mercer which becomes another play on empathy. People relate to Mercer through an “empathy box” that allows humans to feel a painful experience with Mercer, an experience androids are unable to have. For me, this brings up the question of whether AI will ever have that extra something, the “soul,” which sets humanity apart from animals, a something we have a hard time defining. If something lacks empathy, or a soul, is it ok to kill it indiscriminately, as we would an ant or a fly? Is religion merely our attempt to understand our empathy, or soul? I won’t spoil the end result of Mercerism, but Dick makes a clear statement about religion with it.

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? is distinct from the two movies I cited above in that androids do not have empathy. Dick makes it clear that androids do not care about human life or even the lives of other androids, but the more modern stories tend to show artificially intelligent robots as if they have a soul, giving them equal standing with humans, if not more standing as they supersede us. This seems to reflect a social and political shift in America, if not the world, as we become more accepting of different lifestyles and perspectives. I’m curious how modern readers would take to Dick’s androids, and I’ll probably have to watch the movie Blade Runner and its sequel Blade Runner: 2049 to see how others have taken his story and updated it. Reading this book is refreshing, entertaining, and enlightening. If you enjoy a good story, it works, and if you enjoy a thoughtful sci-fi, it does well.

Check out my article on Isaac Asimov’s I, Robot, another great sci-fi relevant to today’s AI issues.

Review of Frank Herbert’s Dune

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Frank Herbert’s Dune is an epic science fiction that grabs readers early on and takes them on a journey through a distant, dangerous land full of grand characters whose competing political, economic, military, and religious goals bring them together in a clash of egos, prophecies, and the pursuits of revenge and survival. It is a lengthy and complicated story, but Herbert keeps readers hooked by bringing us back to the same themes over and again. One couldn’t specify the primary plot or theme as one of political, economic, or religious conflict because each one is thoroughly developed, and they are too deeply intertwined to be separated.

Simply stated, Dune is about Paul Atreides’s ascension to political, military, and religious leadership on the planet Arrakis. The story begins with Paul’s father, Duke Leto, moving his family and his army to the planet Arrakis to take over the production of spice from the Harkonnen family while the Baron Vladimir Harkonnen and the Padishah Emperor conspire against the Atreides family with the help of the manipulations of the Bene Gesserit, a group of women who cultivate supernatural abilities and work behind the scenes to affect politics and even gene lines. Paul’s mother, Jessica, is a Bene Gesserit who trains him in their ways and abilities. They escape the Harkonnens with the help of Fremen, who are Arrakis locals. The Harkonnen were destroying the Fremen, but the Atreides were courting them for an alliance. Paul and Jessica meet up with Stilgar, a Fremen leader, who takes them in and teaches them the Fremen ways. Meanwhile, there are political maneuverings among the Harkonnens and the Emperor, and Paul becomes a military leader who contemplates taking on the role of a Fremen messiah before moving them against their enemies.

Throughout the story, one aspect that holds it together is the emphasis on the harshness of the planet’s desert environment; the dangers of the desert are connected to politics, betrayal, Paul’s ascension, and even economics. Duke Leto recognizes the significance of the desert in his leadership strategy: “‘On Caladan, we ruled with sea and air power,’ the Duke said. ‘Here, we must scrabble for desert power’” (170). That desert power becomes a crucial point to Paul’s ascension; before that can begin, he expresses to his mother the urgency of their situation while they wait in a tent for their friend Idaho: “‘We can wait through the day for Idaho, but not through another night. In the desert, you must travel by night and rest in the shade through the day’” (310). The Imperial Planetologist Liet-Kynes explains the science behind his predicament: “If he could smell the pre-spice mass, that meant the gases deep under the sand were nearing explosive pressure. He had to get away from here” (437-438). Frank Herbert clearly did his research on the desert to create this mysterious and dangerous world, yet rather than beat it over the reader’s head, he blends it into the different parts of the story so that the reader never forgets the ever-present threat of the desert while connecting it to the various themes.

Herbert’s style is very accessible. He is firmly in the science fiction genre with advanced technology, space travel, and gadgets, but it isn’t written in cryptic jargon that limits readership. Instead, he uses words that convey an other-worldness while keeping their meaning clear. The Fremen Jamis exclaims that Paul lacks their austere leanness and carries a wealth of extra water: “‘He’s full-fleshed and with a surfeit of water. The ones who carried their pack say there’s literjons of water in it. Literjons! And us sipping our catchpockets the instant they show dewsparkle’” (484). And it isn’t difficult to understand what the Reverend Mother means when she says, “You’ll ride upon your own two feet without ‘thopter or groundcar or mount” (48), and yet, the reader still has a sense that locomotion works differently there.

Despite all that is done well, I still found the book frustrating. The most distracting aspect is how Herbert moves the point of view between characters without a clear transition, which gets confusing – it can take a moment to figure out whose perspective is expressed from paragraph to paragraph. Also, the pacing changes about halfway through. The story moves smoothly leading up to the betrayal of the Atreides and maintains a sense that things are accelerating. However, after Paul and Jessica join the Fremen, the pacing slows and the story loses focus. While the political intrigue continues on and off the planet and Paul wrestles with who he is in relation to the prophecies and his fallen family line, the sense of urgency goes away as the tensions seem to be put on hold. What keeps the reader going is the need to know what happens to Paul; this is almost satisfied with the ending that brings the themes together in an all-encompassing scene that seems to force its conclusion while still leaving unresolved questions about what happens next. For instance, I don’t feel that Paul’s conflict with preventing a holy war is ever fully resolved, and this is a part of his internal conflict for most of the story.

In the end, the book is worth reading, but I’m not sure I want to read the sequel unless I have a lot of time to kill.

Dune audiobook. Dune hardcover. Dune kindle.

Poetic Justice

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The poetic prophet Isaiah © jodie777 - Fotolia.com

The poetic prophet Isaiah
© jodie777 – Fotolia.com

Based on Isaiah 28:1-13

What is good poetry? It is beautiful, has a depth of meaning, and expresses a truth that we can see at work around us. The prophet Isaiah is so poetic! Let me show you:

Woe to the proud crown of the drunkards of Ephraim,
And to the fading flower of its glorious beauty,
Which is at the head of the fertile valley
Of those who are overcome with wine!
Behold, the Lord has a strong and mighty agent;
As a storm of hail, a tempest of destruction,
Like a storm of mighty overflowing waters,
He has cast it down to the earth with His hand.
The proud crown of the drunkards of Ephraim is trodden under foot.
And the fading flower of its glorious beauty,
Which is at the head of the fertile valley,
Will be like the first-ripe fig prior to summer,
Which one sees,
And as soon as it is in his hand,
He swallows it. (NASB) Isa 28:1-4

It stands out to me in this passage that those who are against God are described as beautiful and having glory. God gives us such incredible ability to create beautiful things: buildings and compositions and organizations. He made us beautiful and placed us in a world that overflows with magnificent beauty. He also gave us a choice to pursue and enjoy this beauty for his glory or ours, to serve him or ourselves. Too often we serve ourselves.

What concerns me most is not how non-believers serve themselves, but how the church and Christians are doing this very thing, which is what this chapter in Isaiah is all about. I wish I could play the audio from the dramatized NIV audio version, it does a great job of expressing it. But the word will have to suffice here:

And these also stagger from wine
and reel from beer:
Priests and prophets stagger from beer
and are befuddled with wine;
they reel from beer,
they stagger when seeing visions,
they stumble when rendering decisions.
All the tables are covered with vomit
and there is not a spot without filth.
“Who is it he is trying to teach?
To whom is he explaining his message?
To children weaned from their milk,
to those just taken from the breast?
For it is:
Do this, do that,
a rule for this, a rule for that;
a little here, a little there.” (NIV) Isa 28:7-10

At first, I wondered why the priests were drunk. Were they depressed? Is the drunkenness symbolic of their self-indulgence and abuse of their position? The way they mock the prophet explains it, I believe.

I have seen Christians, friends as well as church leaders on television and in print, make excuses for the standard in the Bible. They make excuses for their pursuit of pleasure, for their sin, and mock the Bible by saying it is outdated or misunderstood. Like these drunk priests Isaiah describes, in order to validate our pursuit of pleasure we must discredit the Bible’s teaching. Discredit is too small a word for what is really being done, though. Malign is more accurate, and honest Christians would agree.

The pleasures we pursue sinfully are not ugly and sinful in themselves. God gave us beauty and pleasure in our wine and sex and art and music and the ability to build and create and organize, and he wants us to use and implement all these things. But he wants us to do it to his glory, not ours, because he created them and gave them to us. It is simply a matter of respect. We are created and we ought to hold our Maker high esteem. We do this by enjoying the beauty and pleasures of this world within the confines he gave us. Drink in moderation, sleep only with your spouse, build in prayer, compose the beauty of God’s truths, organize and lead in humility and meekness.

The Bible is clear about what will happen to those who, like these mocking priests, malign God’s truths:

Very well then, with foreign lips and strange tongues
God will speak to this people,
to whom he said,
“This is the resting place, let the weary rest”;
and, “This is the place of repose”—
but they would not listen.
So then, the word of the Lord to them will become:
Do this, do that,
a rule for this, a rule for that;
a little here, a little there —
so that as they go they will fall backward;
they will be injured and snared and captured. (NIV) Isa 28:11-13

Notice, the poetry they used to mock God is used against them. Observe as well that before God’s judgment came, he reached out to these mockers, even using the same words Jesus spoke years later, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” (NIV) Mat 11:28 (italics added)

The poetic prophecy continues with what I believe is the most important part. When we enjoy and exercise God’s beauty appropriately, he offers a promise:

In that day the Lord Almighty
will be a glorious crown,
a beautiful wreath
for the remnant of his people.
He will be a spirit of justice
to the one who sits in judgment,
a source of strength
to those who turn back the battle at the gate. (NIV) Isa 28:5-6

See how God wears the crown, not us. If God is our glory and not ourselves, if we pursue his beauty instead of ours, he promises to be our strength at the gate where our enemies come against us to mock us and hurt us and tear us down. This is truly poetic justice in every sense of the phrase, with beauty and irony and depth and truth.

Blessings!

The Rot of Atheism

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With or without justice, we will all some day rot
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There was this guy at a church I attended for a period of time who had a story; it went like this. He was an accountant who entered into a partnership with another, but one day federal agents came and told him one of the deals he and his partner conducted was illegal. This was strange to him, because he did not know anything about this deal. It was his partner’s, but the partner’s name was not on the documentation. After years of being harassed by federal agents and taking his case all the way to the Supreme Court, he learned that his partner was actually connected to organized crime and had dumped the illicit business on his shoulders. However, the courts were so convinced he was a well-connected gangster that they initially denied his request for court appointed counsel, which he required since his assets had been frozen; his fate was sealed when the appointed counsel did not call any witnesses to his defense. The counsel apparently also believed he was a gangster. He spent four years in prison and can no longer practice his profession. That business partner, who truly was a gangster, died peacefully in his bed without ever experiencing justice.

Switching gears, I was watching a TV interview of an atheist group promoting their viewpoint at a booth (or rather, opposing the Christian perspective), when they were asked, “What happens when you die?” Their response was, “You rot.”

I think this is significant. If there is no God, no ultimate Creator, no Supreme Being looking out for us, then when we die, we rot. There would be no judgment, which some people would cheer about, but there also would be no justice.

I have another example, something that affects us all. A few years ago America went through an economic crisis that we, and the world, are still recovering from. Why did we have this crisis? The political and financial leadership of this country knew what would result from the risky lending and yet they allowed it to continue. None of the leadership elite suffered from the economic crisis, it was the poor and the middle class who suffered, and continue to suffer. The 10% of the country that is without work, the families that lost their homes, those driven to complete homelessness, these all suffered because the leadership of this country failed to do their job and interrupt something that was completely preventable. None of them will ever be punished for doing that to us. Not in this life, and if the atheists are correct, not after they lay to rot in the dirt.

I read a quote from a secular humanist society that went something like this, “What makes our belief so unattractive is that it is just so bad.” What this was referring to is that if there is no God then there is no morality, no punishment of the wicked, no vindication of the oppressed, and ultimately no hope. You are all on your own.

My point is that justice does not always happen in this life and often the wicked persevere, living comfortably while their innocent victims suffer until their death. These two examples of mine are about socio-economic suffering, but what about all those children kidnapped every year who are never found, possibly taken across borders to be forced into prostitution? Rape and murder victims whose assailant is never caught? How about the tens of millions of Chinese who died because of Mao Zedong’s screwy policies and political maneuvers, and other victims of self-serving dictators? There are copious examples that are even more extreme.

Apart from God, we are all on our own, destined to struggle and rot.

My book The Rage is about redemption, because I believe there is Someone looking out for us.

Be Blessed

How I Feel Today (October 2012)

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I feel rent. Can you relate?
© Anchels – Fotolia.com

Rent

I push and pull, then heave struggle

To fight sans rest, oh toss this test

They sing and shout, so blind to doubt

I chafe then hide, can’t feign the pride

 

The shell in which I hide, conceals what is inside

The joy it seems presides, in me does not abide

 

It burns deeply within, a fight I want to end

I long for hope to win, can’t bear to fall again

 

Scripture tells me I’m blessed, heaven will follow death

What I desire is rest, I welcome what comes next

 

Unwilling to pre-empt, I’ll press ahead till spent

My faith in truth unbent, patient for my assent

 

* * *

 

Feeling incapable? Unworthy? Tired of the fight? My book The Rage is about not being good enough.

Hang in there, I am. And be blessed!