Darkness Comes by John Lynch

Darkness Comes by John Lynch.
Published 28th December 2019 by Mandrill Press.
Read July 2020.

Ted has lived a life that can hardly be called virtuous - he has been selfish, greedy and even committed the mortal sin of murder - and he has never given a thought about what might happen to him on Judgement Day (if he believed in that sort of thing).

But that day has now come - rather inconveniently while he is in a hotel room on holiday in the Canary Islands, and in the company of a young woman.

It is time for Ted's life to be held in the balance - for his immortal soul to be judged. And in the words of St. Peter - "It doesn't look good."

******************************************************

What a fascinating read this book turned out to be!

Ted appears to have reached the end of his allotted time on the earth, when Judgement Day comes calling while he is engaged in a strenuous amorous adventure with a much younger woman, during his holiday in The Canaries.

The time has arrived for Ted's life to be judged and the decision to be made about where his soul will spend eternity, and since he has lived a less than innocent life things are not looking good.

Ted's trial takes the form of a cross between This Is Your Life and a game show, as episodes from his past are displayed on a huge television screen for the jury and audience to see, and pass judgement on. These snatches of Ted's life almost always seem to revolve round the women in his life, the decisions he has made in rspect of his relationships and the resulting fall-out.

But Ted is not friendless in this surreal and frightening environment, because he has been appointed an advocate to plead his case by St Peter - someone very close to him in the past, who is free to cast a different light on what at first appears to be an open and shut case, by bringing up examples of Ted's life which have shown him to be a worthy human being.

Ted's life (or more accurately, death) hangs in the balance - and I promise you will be unable to put this book down until you know the outcome! But this is a spoiler free zone!

This book asks some interesting philosophical questions about how you decide whether someone's life tips the balance between a good or bad one, in the most entertaining of ways. Not to mention the poser of how much trauma in your young life can be seen as an influence on your future behaviour, and the nature of guilt. No one is wholly good or bad and even many of the World's acknowledged monsters had people who loved them: even the blackest of hearts may be capable of mercy and kindness at times. Can cases be made be made to mitigate the blame?

Of course, John Lynch's book holds with the religious theology that there will be a judging at the end of your life and a decision will be made about where your soul will spend eternity - Heaven or Hell - whether or not you believe this yourself. But at the same time, this book also turns this idea on its head. In his reality, humankind have some serious misconceptions about the nature of God and religion, and who has the right to judge whether someone has lived a good life or not. I am not a religious person, but found this very thought provoking, none-the-less. At the very least, this may lead you to question how the balance of your own life falls...and perhaps make amends, if necessary!

Darkness Comes is available to buy now from your favourite book retailer, or via the link HERE.

Thank you to John Lynch and Mandrill Press for provding me with a copy of this book in return for an honest review, and to Anne Cater of Random Things Tours for inviting me to be part of this blog tour.

From the cover of the book:

Ted has been many things……selfish, greedy, and even a murderer. 

How will he survive judgment day? 

Ted’s in a hotel room, with a woman named Bella, in the Canary Islands. 

He’s moments from death. 

In retrospect, he’d made it to the end and never paid for the drug dealing, gun running, 

or even the people he’s killed. Let the trial begin. St. Peter said, “It doesn’t look good. ”

This other world, one we think of as the afterlife, isn’t as advertised. 

There is a God, but this Deity isn’t the God people imagine. 

Ted’s judgment day will peel back the layers of his life. Is there redemption to be found? 

Will the ruling be Heaven or Hell? Or is there something else? 

Before they can begin, Ted needs an advocate. 

After a lifetime of deceit, will anyone stand for him? 

You’ll love this clever look at a life, because what we see on the surface is often only 

a shade of the truth. 

Get it now.

About the author:

For 40+ years, John Lynch was an international salesman. He has lived and worked on every continent except Antarctica, but was always a writer, though; the very first writing success he remembers was standing on the stage of Benton Park Primary School in Newcastle upon Tyne at the age of ten, reading to the assembled school and parents a story he had written. It still gives him pleasure to know that one of his fellow pupils -- a man he has dinner with once a year when he goes back to Newcastle -- was nagged all the way home that afternoon by his mother demanding, "Why can't you write like John Lynch?".

He sold my first freelance piece to Good Housekeeping Magazine in 1989 and that was a good year for him - it was also when he sold his first book to a publisher and his first short story to BBC Radio. (It's called Bird and you can listen to it on his blog). His mother, the daughter of a Durham miner who first went down the pit when he was 12 years old, was proud that her son had a story on the radio -- but even prouder that it was read by Clarrie Grundy from the long-running radio serial, The Archers.

He has ghost written about 50 books that have been published in other people's names (you'll find a video about that on his Author Page) as well as writing his own work. As himself, he writes under two names:

As R J Lynch for a series of five books set in County Durham (with one in the revolutionary American colonies) in the 1760s.

As John Lynch for contemporary fiction and two non-fiction books.

See more about John Lynch here: Author's website     Twitter