"This is not a normal book with a normal story..."
It is the story of a lonely white dolphin, and a tree, curiously shaped like a guitar with too many strings. Of an outcast singer, a honeybee and other strange misfits who help a young boy bring long-awaited rain to seven precious gifts, that have lain dormant for aeons in the parched body of the Earth. The rain awakens the gifts; and the gifts awaken the boy. And the boy awakens the Earth.
"I've never seen anything like this before."
Assessment:
Plot: This book is highly unusual in format – it’s not a novel, and more a fable. The angel instructs a young boy in the important things in life. The angel’s tale itself is gently instructive, but not pedantic. The beings that help represent these lessons - and show the boy how to attain these gifts - are quite wonderful and whimsical: a bee, a bird, and a white dolphin, among them.
Prose/Style: This is very smooth writing, even funny at times. The seven lessons flow together well. A copyeditor might help with some punctuation issues.
Originality: This is a highly original concept. Few fables are published these days for adults, and the advice in the lessons is well timed for today's readers.
Character Development: The characters are charming and/or evil, but the reader doesn’t quite get to know them over the course of the book. Perhaps the most fleshed out characters are the boy and the musician, Coalhole Custer.
Date Submitted: June 12, 2019
Assessment:
Plot: The story of the revelations of the seven gifts through what are both traditional and newly-fashioned stories is accessible to a wide range of readers and proves to be an entertaining read. The underlying lessons and messages about morality help to sustain a lovely, thoughtful pace during the novel.
Prose: This book offers an old-fashioned, nostalgia-inducing storytelling voice, which uses charming turns of phrase. However, there is also a modern facet to the tone, and contemporary turns of phrase appear throughout.
Originality: This is a wonderful current-day twist on fairy tales, faith, subjective morality, and the search for universal truths.
Character Development: A number of diverse characters are peppered throughout the foundational story and the tales themselves, and they are all exceptionally, uniquely distinct and memorable.
Blurb: This book is the melding of sweet simplicity meeting marvelous depth.
Date Submitted: August 14, 2018
The Seven Gifts, The Sailor, Strange Land - Perhaps the most unusual book you’ll ever read, it is just as educational and inspiring as Kahil Gibran’s The Prophet, but far more readable and enjoyable. The device is an angel, instructing a boy waiting to be born by requiring him to read seven books, each with a lesson, which the boy needs to find. It is fantasy, with a great deal of humor and set in a mythical kingdom, but all too applicable to our world today. Each of the seven stories stands alone, but they are interlinked. The writing can only be described as beautiful, with one exception. The first story turns into unmitigated horror. It is worth pushing through, because of the inspiring lessons of the whole, and because it would be a great shame to miss the other six stories, and the impact of the totality.
