Title: Black: The Birth of Evil (The Circle #1) by Ted Dekker

Pages: 432

Genres: Fantasy, Christian, Fiction

Published by: Thomas Nelson (Dec. 25, 2003)

Summary

Enter an adrenaline-laced epic where dreams and reality collide.

Fleeing his assailants through deserted alleyways, Thomas Hunter narrowly escapes to the roof of a building. Then a silent bullet from the night clips his head…and his world goes black.

From the blackness comes an amazing reality of another world-a world where evil is contained. A world where Thomas Hunter is in love with a beautiful woman. Then he remembers the dream of the chase as he reaches to touch the blood on his head.

Where does the dream end and reality begin? Every time he falls asleep in one world, he awakes in the other-both facing catastrophic disaster. Thomas is being pushed beyond his limits…even beyond the limits of space and time.

Black is an incredible story of evil and rescue, betrayal and love, pursuit and death, and a terrorist’s threat unlike anything the human race has ever known.

Some say the world hangs in the balance of every choice we make. Now the fate of two worlds hangs in the balance of one man’s choice.

What I Thought

This. Book. Was. Intense!  In many Christian circles, Ted Dekker is is THE writer for novels filled with action and suspense.  I’ve heard a lot of praise for Ted Dekker’s novels, but Black was actually the first novel of his that I’ve read, so I wasn’t sure what exactly I was expecting.  I’m really glad I decided to pick this book up though!

First of all, I just love the entire premise for this book.  In fact, that is what initially drew me to this story.  The idea of living between two completely different realities was just so intriguing.  It instantly filled me with questions and kept my attention.  Is one world a dream and the other reality? If so, which one is real life? Are they both real?  This book just made me want to keep knowing more.

Also, the world building that went into this novel was so good!  One of Thomas’ realities is on our earth, his other, however, is a world vastly different from today.  From the setting, to the characters, it was just so fantastic!  The entire novel, in both realities, just feels so well thought out and well written. Ted Dekker did such a great job of intricately weaving everything together into one epic novel, and I loved it.

There were some really great characters in Black, too!  Thomas was such a good lead character, and I felt like his troubled past really made a perfect backdrop for this story.  I also really loved his sister; she was so supportive, yet was someone who could completely handle herself.  Also, I’m not someone who particularly loves love triangles, but the possible/sort of love triangle forming for Thomas between realities left me really intrigued.

Overall, this was a really enjoyable book.  It’s action-packed and filled with suspense, and left me hungry for more!  I cannot wait to read the next book, Red.  I’m definitely starting to understand the Ted Dekker hype.  I would recommend this book to fans of action and fantasy novels.