Michael FrederickRezensionen

FROM PUBLISHER: A coming of age story set in the mid-sixties, in America's Heartland, where the dark side of of human nature was accepted as normal, where unspoken reality stood ready to revealits painto all of us who this awful wonderous time. The story spans three years in the lives of four teenagers connected to a small Nebraska town called Paradise.

FROM AMAZON: What is Ledges? Mystery. Suspense. Thriller.
In 1959, a beautiful Des Moines mother of three marries a wealthy farmer, twice her age, in search of "the good life." On the Beal Farm near Ledges State Park, just south of Boone, two children uncover the brutal past of their new stepfather.

Take a ride on this emotional rollercoaster in the Heartland,

Eddie Dense barely graduated from high school; then he hit the road in his van to write his first novel. He had to get away from his dysfunctional parents in order to search for and write about the elusive Blue River. His best friends had found it... and now they're gone.

The premise of this book was a good one: A story that follows the lives & places of each of the individuals in mulitple generations of a particular family as they make their way through difficulties that includes early & unwanted marriages, paralysis, prison, rape, and the harvest of the family legacy from a cactus plant.

I completed reading the book because the premise was good. However, I would in no way say that this was a well-written book. The writing exemplified why some authors self-publish: Their writing is not good enough for a publisher to buy.

Uck. I gave this book one star. I cannot endorse it at all. I paid a quarter for this book; I paid too much.

I am a bibliophile; I own many thousands of books. Still there are books I read that I do not want to keep. Normally I donate them to a thrift store. I will not donate this one; I will tear it to pieces and throw it into my garbage can.

This next part is written to those who claim to be Christ-followers, of which I am one. My aversion to this book becomes stronger in light of the author's repeated urging for his characters to trace a certain colored figure in their minds, supposedly releasing them from bad thoughts that negatively affect their lives. I see this type of tracing akin to the New Age practice of "Positive Thinking" and is contrary to God's instructions to us. Tracing would not release people from bad thoughts; it would open their mind to spirits not from God; a traced & emptied mind would be blank of whatever else could fill it, so an evil spirit would find space enough to wreak its havoc.

Jesus talked of this in the New Testament in Matthew 12:43ff "(verse 43) When an evil spirit leaves a person, it travels through the desert, looking for a place to rest. But when the demon doesn't find a place, (44) it says, 'I will go back to the home I left.' When it gets there and finds the place empty, clean, and fixed up, (45) it goes off and finds seven other evil spirits even worse than itself. They all come and make their home there, and the person ends up in worse shape than before. That's how it will be with you evil people of today."

Why would a Believer want to empty their minds instead of filling their minds with God's Word?

Those who believe in Jesus should not read this book, under any circumstances, because of the urging to trace. Others should not read it because it is poorly written.