This was a slim little volume of writings…which could have handled a few hundred more pages.

The writing was simple and effective and the story line was fairly well planned out, but there were a lot of gaps where you simply had to go on faith that that’s the way the novel needed to progress and all things happen for a reason. Sorry, I need a little more than that.

In short, a talented, young, teenage stonecutter’s apprentice has developed exceptional skills in the art of tombstone construction. When these talents are identified by a mysterious stranger, the young stonecutter is summoned to a far off estate for a special project where not all is as it seems. Struggling between a duty he doesn’t fully understand and providing assistance not welcome by all, the rest of the novel proceeds along its path.

But who is the mysterious man? Why does he act the way he does? Why is so little told about the project? Why on earth would his master agree to let him go? Is he a guest or a prisoner? What’s the deal with the girl? What is wrong with the others at the estate? None of these questions are ever answered – and the result isn’t an exalted text which requires pensive thought and philosophical analysis. It simply feels like the author forgot to mention them. Or he was running out of paper.

What was there, I liked. What I could connect within my mind was good. But what was left off would have served the author well. ( )