By Melissa Mahoney

Ted Dekker’s Black, is a great start to his trilogy. A fast-paced, combination of fantasy, “reality” and excellent story telling makes this a page-turner to the last moment.

Black focuses around Thomas Hunter. The novel begins with Hunter being chased by some hitman, because he tries to put down Valborg Svensson’s plot to take over the world through the use of a serum that has the ability to kill people within three weeks. Hunter tries to steal the vaccine for this, so that Svensson’s attempts to only give the vaccine to people who allow his takeover, can live. Hunter is knocked unconscious in his attempt, and wakes up to find himself in this dark forest, surrounded by bats.

These two worlds dominate their story, with Hunter entering them every time he wakes up. Hunter has to find a way to save himself, and both of the worlds, from destruction. Every time Hunter wakes up, he’s in one of the two worlds. He questions what world he is in.

Dekker seems to want to confuse the reader at times, so that they, along with Hunter, can no longer tell which world is reality. The one that seems close to ours, or the one that seems like something out of our fantasy tales. It makes readers think more into how people perceive worlds and dreams, and maybe, like Hunter’s, or dreams are other worlds.

As one who is normally put off by Christian writers, I was pleasantly surprised with the way the story went. It was very well written; the way Dekker presents Hunter, his sister and the way his love is blooming is excellent. Not the typical type of Christian writing, and if I had to pick a different genre to place it, I wouldn’t even know where to start.

Dekker does use his story to show that there is karma, and that things you do today, will effect things in the future. This is done through an “Adam and Eve” creation story type of circumstance, which is really one place where Christianity is brought into the story.

One major problem with the story involves its Christian fiction category. Many of the metaphors are hard to get for active Christians, and even harder for a person, like myself, who isn’t Christian.

The other two books in this trilogy are Red, the second of the trilogy, and White, which have already been published. White, was published earlier this month. If you’d like a fast reading book, Black¸ by Ted Dekker is a good one to check out.