CSFF Blog Tour – <i>Beyond the Reflection’s Edge</i>, a Review

Beyond the Reflection’s Edge, by Bryan Davis (Zondervan), is categorized as adventure fantasy (for a definition, see my post yesterday at Speculative Faith). That’s fairly accurate, though I think it is considerably more. It’s contemporary, has an element of science fiction and another of supernatural suspense. In short, it is the Bryan Davis genre.

The Story. Protagonist Nathan Shepherd, a sixteen-year-old high school student, discovers the bodies of his parents, with the apparent murderer standing over them. He escapes for his life, eventually seeking refuge with another family where he meets Kelly, a girl close to his age.

Together they discover strange happenings in his room connected with the wall-sized mirror and the smaller square mirror his dad gave him shortly before his death. These mirrors, alone and in combination, lead to high adventure as the two teens, not knowing who they can trust, work to save the cosmos from calamity.

That’s all I’m telling, and that’s more than I usually give. Actually, I think that’s enough for readers to get a flavor of this story and should give them an idea whether or not it’s one they would enjoy.

Strengths. There’s much to like in Beyond the Reflection’s Edge, not the least being the characters. Bryan has portrayed a realistic teen grieving for his parents. He’s also done a good job creating Kelly as a distinct girl who has some bitterness about her own parents. The adults, in my opinion, seem much more true to life than in past Davis books.

The story is intriguing. There are appropriate twists and turns, and just about the time I thought something didn’t work, Bryan provided a plausible explanation. The action doesn’t feel too fast paced. There are times for the reader to get to know the characters, but that’s still through action.

There is sufficient tension and the stakes are certainly high—both the external stakes and Nathan’s personal ones—so I was drawn through the story by the questions the events raised.

The setting was clear. It was apparent Bryan did his research. He knew the places, so it was easy to trust him with the logistics. Rarely did I feel lost or like I needed to backtrack to figure out where the characters were in relation to one another.

Weaknesses. I have two main concerns, and I think in explaining them, I’m forced to give spoilers, so a SPOILER ALERT is in order.

First, in the climax, Nathan finds his parents alive, in another dimension, and must decide to pull them back into their correct dimension or save Kelly who has fallen into the hands of the villain who wants to kill Nathan and his parents. The problem here, as I see it, is that Nathan, should he decide to bring his parents into his dimension, will essentially be handing them over to the killer who no one so far has been able to stop. Consequently, the internal tension—should he save Kelly or save his parents—seems false to me. It was never a good idea to bring his parents within reach of the killer, no matter how much Nathan may have wanted to be back with his family, because then they would surely have died.

The other problem I saw has to do with the “faith elements.” I don’t like that term, as some of you may remember from another post. But here’s the thing: if a character is established as a Christian, it seems to me, he should have some evidence of having a relationship with God. Nathan has a strong moral code, he indicates he wants to go to church, he tells Kelly to pray when they’re in trouble. But when she says all she knows is the Our Father, he says that’s good enough (or something to that effect), and later tells her it’s time for another Our Father. At one point he says a quick prayer before starting off to do something dangerous. But there is no thought about God creating different dimensions and how or why, there’s no curiosity about sin or wondering if Christ came to all the places, no thoughts about his parents being in heaven that I recall. In other words, in the really big issues and during the critical times when I would expect a Christian to think differently, Nathan seems very much the same as his non-Christian friend.

END SPOILER ALERT

Of course, some of these issues may be addressed in later books, for clearly this story continues in Eternity’s Edge. In addition, this latter “faith elements” poin does not detract from the surface level story.

Recommendation. I found Beyond the Reflection’s Edge to be an intriguing story with good, believable characters. It was enjoyable. I highly recommend the book to those who prefer contemporary over other-world fantasy.

Take some time now to see what other bloggers on the CSFF tour have to say about Beyond the Reflection’s Edge:

Brandon Barr
Jennifer Bogart
Justin Boyer
√ Keanan Brand
√ Kathy Brasby
Jackie Castle
√√ Valerie Comer
Courtney
CSFF Blog Tour
√√ Stacey Dale
D. G. D. Davidson
√√ Shane Deal
Janey DeMeo
√ Jeff Draper
April Erwin
Karina Fabian
Andrea Graham
√ Todd Michael Greene
Katie Hart
√√ Timothy Hicks
√ Joleen Howell
Jason Joyner
√√ Kait
√ Mike Lynch
Magma
√√ Margaret
Rachel Marks
Melissa Meeks
√ Eve Nielsen
√ Nissa
√√ John W. Otte
√√ Steve Rice
Ashley Rutherford
Mirtika or Mir’s Here
√ Chawna Schroeder
√ Greg Slade
√ James Somers
√ Speculative Faith
√ Steve Trower
Robert Treskillard Not on the original list
√ Jason Waguespac
√ Laura Williams
Timothy Wise

“√” indicates I know a blog post is up.