CSFF Tour Day 2 – The Fatal Tree

by Jason Joyner | Dec 17, 2014 | Blog, Uncategorized

In Which The Blogger Gets Deadly Serious

Hey, you’re back. I didn’t lose you yesterday in trying to discuss the Bright Empires series by Stephen Lawhead for the CSFF Tour. If you missed it, I gave an overview of the first four books. This month we’re featuring The Fatal Tree, the final book in the journey.

Tomorrow I’ll give my review of the book and the series, but I wanted to talk about a couple of the Big Ideas from the series.

The series revolves around the idea of the Omniverse. Similar to the idea of a multiverse, the key hypothesis is that travel between other realities is possible via ley lines, ancient structures made on the Earth when ancients felt the power resident in the lines. The characters in the book can’t travel into future possibilities, but they can enter variations of past events.

This is wondrous, fertile ground for a speculative fiction author or reader. The idea of exploring what happens when different choices are made is very intriguing. One character prevents the Great London Fire of 1666 by simply waking the baker whose oven triggers the catastrophe. But in another version of London in 1666 the baker sleeps, and London burns.

Characters wrestle with this idea along with the idea of God and His role in it. It seems that Creation is more mysterious and mind-boggling that we can conceive, and the idea of the Omniverse and the interconnection through the ley lines is one way that the author contemplates the power of God in the universe/multiverse. The concepts introduced in the Bright Empires series have a lot of potential, and a story is a much more interesting way of wrestling with them than reading a textbook or paper on theoretical astrophysics. In my opinion, at least.

There’s another thread of redemption and trying to correct wrongs done in life. The way these threads are intertwined are very powerful. Can an evil person change? Can we undo damage that we’ve done with our actions in the past? Who wouldn’t like to change a bad choice from our past.

I remember a day when I was five. My dad was mowing lawns on a Sunday afternoon, first for an elderly lady, and then at our house. He came to take a break on the bed we had on our back deck, while I read comic books at the kitchen table.

I went outside and found him breathing funny. I got my mom right away, and before I knew it I was taken to a friend’s house while an ambulance came. I knew it was serious because my friend already had someone over, and he never was allowed to have two friends over, yet I stayed.

My dad died of a heart attack that day.

I wonder at times what would have happened if I had found my dad sooner. Would he have survived? But if he had, I can’t imagine that I would be with my wife or have my kids. Even though I missed having my dad, the chance to change that one event would drastically alter my life.

There’s power in the Bright Empires to do that, and the characters discover the consequence of such choices.

So know that The Fatal Tree and the Bright Empire series as a whole isn’t afraid of Big Ideas. There’s meat in there. Come back tomorrow to find out my final thoughts, and check out the other tours listed on Becky Miller’s blog.

CSFF Tour Day 1 – The Fatal Tree

by Jason Joyner | Dec 16, 2014 | Blog, Uncategorized

In Which The End Of Everything Gets Delayed For A Much Needed Recap

The end of the year, and the end of a series.

The CSFF Tour is featuring The Fatal Tree, the 5th and final book in the Bright Empires series by Stephen Lawhead. It’s been a wild ride to get to the End of Everything, which is what The Fatal Tree is about.

But before we get to that, let’s talk about the first four books of the series.

The Skin Map – this starts off the tale with a good place: the beginning. And one of the great lines to start a series.

“Had he but known that before the day was over he would discover the hidden dimensions of the universe, Kit might have been better prepared. At least, he would have brought an umbrella.

Kit Livingstone is an unremarkable Brit with an unremarkable girlfriend, Mina. But when he meets his great-grandfather Cosimo, who happened to be dead, Kit is understandably taken back. Cosimo introduces Kit to ley travel, which allows one to hop dimensions. Unfortunately Kit loses Mina in 16th century Prague and Cosimo finds a permanent home in an Egyptian tomb, thanks to the treacherous Lord Burleigh.

The Bone House – Book two reunites Kit and Mina for a short time, but they must stay ahead of Lord Burleigh, who is trying to track down the Skin Map. Of course, we follow the adventures of Arthur Flinders-Petrie, the owner of the Skin Map, until it somehow is removed from his body at a later time. But that doesn’t happen until Kit is stranded in the Stone Age at the end of the book, growing a great hipster beard in the process.

The Spirit Well – Characters start joining in the quest for the Skin Map, as American paleontologist Cassandra Clarke stumbles upon a ley line in Sedona, Arizona. Arthur makes a fateful visit to the Spirit Well. Mina introduces Kit to Gianni, a well-educated monk. And the Skin Map is ready to take off on its own.

The Shadow Lamp – Finally the fourth book stirs the pot and leaves many people in difficult situations. Lady Haven and Giles the servant end up with Bulgar armies in the Middle Ages. Lord Burleigh lets his temper get the best of him. Douglas Flinders-Petrie, an ancestor of Arthur, also finds himself in a difficult situation. Kit, Mina, and Cass fight to understand and intervene as friends predict the End of Everything.

Confused?

You should be. Lawhead has conceived of this story 15 years prior to when he started writing the Bright Empires series. It is impossible to sum up four books without major spoilers. The solution is simple: order the books for Christmas!

I’ll talk more about the books on Tuesday and Wednesday. In the meantime, Becky Miller always collects the posts for the tour and notes them here. And you can see the various tour mates below to see what the Bright Empires holds.

Julie Bihn
Thomas Clayton Booher
Beckie Burnham
Jeff Chapman
Karri Compton
April Erwin
Victor Gentile
Jason Joyner
Janeen Ippolito
Carol Keen
Emileigh Latham
Rebekah Loper
Shannon McDermott
Meagan @ Blooming with Books
Rebecca LuElla Miller
Nissa
Jalynn Patterson
Writer Rani
Nathan Reimer
Audrey Sauble
Jojo Sutis
Rachel Starr Thomson
Robert Treskillard
Steve Trower
Shane Werlinger
Phyllis Wheeler