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2,435 Public Reviews Given
2,435 Total Reviews Given
Review Style
I try to be honest and positive. My Christian faith is an important background factor. I hate rating low but have a system that determines how I grade.
 
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My Philosophy of Rating and Reviewing Open in new Window. (E)
How do I assess people's work when reviewing?
#2259390 by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
I'm good at...
More interested in the content of what you write than the style. Theological, political, historical, scientific, or experiential, or indeed anything that paints a vision of the future. A good grammar checker will tell you about spelling and commas.
Favorite Genres
Not entirely sure as I like most stuff. I prefer something with a soul rather than purely secular. But I like Sci-Fi, anything Christian, and also 'What-if' type speculations with plausible plots.
Least Favorite Genres
Anything that fails to look for a way out of the darkness. You can be dark, just don't wallow in it. Generally, I try to steer clear of Fantasy, and most Dark or Horror stories just make me laugh or grimace due to their ignorance of the dark side.
Favorite Item Types
I have really liked some of the heartwarming dramas I have read here particularly personal stories. Thought-provoking poems or stories are cool also though I am no expert on poetical forms.
Least Favorite Item Types
Anything that is just an affirmation of the dark side. I hate empty words. I always look for human intelligence. I try and avoid Fantasy and Horror where there is no metaphorical resonance or connection with real-world truth.
I will not review...
I mainly review at random and just see what grabs my attention. I will usually skip stuff I do not like unless it gets me riled or if it is interesting for other reasons.
Public Reviews
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Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (4.5)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and stayed to hear your take on this.

Reader Experience

Someone dies, which involves passing through a doorway to another realm. It is a world of blinding light. When his eyes adjust he sees the god of death, pale and blonde, blue-eyed and dressed in green gems. The god of death (aka Dream) says that he is his friend and then asks the author who he thinks he is. Despite an inconclusive answer, he is then sent on through another doorway. It will be hard but I know that you can do was the affirmation the god concluded with.

Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

So we have two characters in this story. The author is on a journey from this life to whatever comes next and the god of death (aka Dream). The god of death is surprisingly friendly and chatty, he both feels like a stranger and yet the author feels at peace in this place despite the disturbing circumstances. This figure appears kind and forgiving rather than cruel and brutal.

The theological assertions here are that death is not an ending but merely a step on the journey. That there is a figure called death who manages this stage in our existence. That he is not an omnipresent Being. That the key question at the moment of our death will be relating to our own self-identity. Failing to answer the author is sent through a doorway in which hardship is promised but also the promise of a conclusion to the story. Presumably, this has not yet been given and because the only question death asked related to identity it seems that this is what needs to be established to finish the story.

In a Christian context, the next door could lead to purgatory. But the focus is not on sin or purging but rather self-identity so that does not really fit. It seems a strange focus that our entire existence is determined by the question of who we are and arriving at an answer to that. The focus here is not on the Divine but rather on us as if it is in ourselves and through our own experiences we arrive at an answer to our own identity rather than in God's presence and with Him as the focus of our lives. Also, this answer is a remembering as if we once knew what it was.

I thought this was a thought-provoking angle on the death experience though I hold a more biblical outlook on what this might look like. Identity seems more like a focus of our times than the actual focus of our lives. It is more about whom we identify with and with what we identify with than ourselves.


Mechanical issues

Nothing I noticed.


Thanks for sharing.

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Review of Second Thoughts  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: ASR | (4.5)
We both entered the same contest and now that it is over I am thankful for having the opportunity to review a very interesting article on the second amendment.

Reader Experience

The second amendment was originally constructed in the context of tension between the Federal and state governments. It facilitated states having their own militias. It has since adapted to the individualism of modern America and become an individual's right to bear arms. The author's view is that it is no longer fit for its purpose. The number of murders, accidents, school shootings, and suicides far outweigh the need for arms for self-defense. Hunters do not need semi-automatics to hunt their prey. Other countries have massively reduced the number of deaths by more restrictive laws on firearms. It is time for a change.


Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

As an outsider to the American political process and having lived in the UK and Germany where gun violence is minimal this article seemed a lot like common sense. You gave good historical and practical reasons why it is time for a change.

Your article provoked a number of thoughts:

1) Historically speaking firearms are a relatively recent invention. I wondered what a constitution framed around the right to carry a spear or sword would have sounded like. Of course, a spear-carrying and broadsword-wielding militia would be pretty ineffective against redcoats as the red Indians found out to their cost. But then someone waving a gun is pretty impotent fighting tanks, drones, bioweapons, and hypersonic nuclear cruise missiles also. So is having a gun a real defense anymore anyway against the "tyranny" of the Federal government. Does Texas have nukes, do private individuals?

2) You compared violent crime stats with the UK. But there is more knife crime in the UK. A lot of American gun violence is suicides which people would have found alternate ways to do even without guns. So the difference is significant but not as much as 50 to 1. If someone wants to kill themself or others they do not need a gun to do that.

3) The question of who owns the monopoly of force in a society is a cultural decision by individual societies. The USA is quite unique in its resistance to the notion that the state alone should possess all the best weapons. This has kept alive a useful tension between the central and the local governments. This resulted in America's most bloody war - the Civil War but has also contributed to some unique entrepreneurial innovations and prosperity. Would Americans ever really want to grant the Federal government a monopoly of force even if practically it already has that as the American military machine is the most potent military force on the planet. Much of the chaos in modern America - like the very inefficient spending on health services modeled on a public-private tension stems from this principle of local v national. Individual v group. It is hard to see that changing any time soon.

4) I love watching the various dramas that America tends to produce that justify firearms in terms of post-apocalyptic situations where only Americans have the firepower to take on the alien invaders after the military has been crushed by an alien invasion. Or only armed Americans can defend themselves against the Zombies. It makes for great drama even if it is completely unreal. But that tension and belief are deeply embedded in American culture and it is unlikely to change overnight.

5) You did not mention the connection between gun violence and drug trade, nor link it with the kind of poverty and crime associated with minorities who are often discriminated against by the criminal justice system and by the economic system in the USA. There is little gun violence in the suburbs, most of it is in the inner cities. So the gun violence is a part of a broader problem there.


Mechanical issues

Did not notice any, the article was too interesting.


Thanks for sharing.

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Review of This is me  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (4.0)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and stayed because the topic was something I was thinking through tonight.

Reader Experience

Sounds like a person writing has had a hard time of things but somehow heroically keeps on struggling on seeking admission to the ranks of the unworthy, hiding the grief that lies deep inside, always loving, forgiving from the fringes of life. Hoping against all odds and still there fighting on.

And then there is she....


Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

So you are the protagonist in this little drama and she is the suspected antagonist. You have it hard yet handle it well, she is a floating voter, torn this way and that by emotions and inconsistencies. Or she only reveals her surface to you and conceals her own depths which you are unable to read. I have never met a perfect woman or man for that matter but I have met loads who thought they were. Is equality a real goal, I think authenticity and honesty is a better ambition. Better to write a truth that lasts forever badly than wax lyrical about lies and tempt others to the dark side. Equality seems like a lie to me. My German is not as good as my wife's German even though I live here and probably never will be. She can tell me that but that does not mean I will strive to improve it. I will reach as high as I can is the best someone can say really. In some things I shall be an eagle soaring high and in others a worm buried deep under the earth reaching for the light.


Mechanical issues

Probably but I did not notice.


Thanks for sharing.

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Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (4.0)
The official contest is over and you won. I have been itching to review all the essays in this list as there is a lot of great stuff here. But I could not do it until now as I had my own entry in the list.

Reader Experience

A veteran from America's Afghanistan deployment shares his view on the plans for a military withdrawal from the country. Will Afghanistan, which has seen so many occupying powers, end up being a greater influence on the USA than America has been on it? Will the hopes of Afghans for their children's future survive the tides of cultural regression that threaten to engulf the place once the US leaves.


Commentary

You won this competition with what I would regard as a personal testimony rather than a well researched essay. Your hands on experience of the place and its people means that your testimony may well be just as authoritative but this was no essay. I am not sure you really addressed the real issues about why America is leaving at all. These have to do with a war weary isolationism in the electorate and a seriously bad economic situation. The place is no paradise so I wondered if your title was not meant to be taken literally also. As a British man, whose family lived in the Raj, I was interested in your view of the Durand Line which was an obvious by product of the 'Great Game' of Britain with the Russians. It helped to keep the peace and was an aid to global stability. One can overestimate the negative impacts on Afghans themselves and in one sense who cares if it kept the general peace. The Americans, to me appear to be repeating strategies the British employed before them. We successfully occupied the place for decades and then decided it was unnecessarily costly to simply stay there and that indeed it would be cheaper to leave and continue the 'Great Game' with bribes for whichever warlord, (drug baron in the modern context), looked like representing our interests. I meet so many Afghan refugees here in Germany, where I live now, and have formed my impression of the place from their experiences of the intolerance of the Taliban and the futility of endless conflicts there and the tribal divisions and narrow minded religious outlook of the people there. One of my son's school friends is Afghan and his parents came just after the USSR invaded the place. It was prosperous then and for a brief period there was real peace. Now 40 years later there has been almost continual warfare and the Afghans must take a considerable amount of the blame for that themselves and the dysfunctional, wounded culture that has resulted and indeed predates both the Soviet and Coalition invasions. The Coalition invasion was their big chance for a change which maybe they blew. If the forces of cultural regression are indeed to prevail now then they have no one to blame for that but themselves. American and indeed British soldiers that died over there did not die in vain, they gave these people a choice about their future and they served their own nation's interests also.

Britain was not ruined by its various wars and occupations of the place and I very much doubt that the Americans will be either and changes in strategy are influenced more by rivals like China, and Russia and new economic realities than this country. It is a myth to describe Afghanistan as being the country that undoes empires. Their disunity and infighting is rather the reason they are continually occupied and that same chaos is usually the reason the empires leave. The empires themselves crumble for different reasons. The USSR was in economic stagnation since the sixties for instance and its persecution of Christians had utterly undermined the moral credibility of Marxism as an ideology. The British empire ended because of a war against tyrants, in which we stood alone in the crucial moments, and because the people of our empire grew to the point that they could reasonably expect self government rather than domination by whichever colonial power was passing by. In both cases Afghanistan was pretty irrelevant. If America crumbles now then it will be due to failure to address deep rooted issues with its economy and borrowing especially or because of an isolationism which surrenders all the advantages it gleans from the world order it helped to create.

Thanks for sharing your experiences of this place which were fascinating and we share the hope that that policeman's child will indeed grow up to be a healer in that wounded land.


Mechanical issues

Nothing worth mentioning.


Thanks for sharing.

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Review of Above It All  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (4.5)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and was glad for the opportunity to experience the flight of the geese

Reader Experience

The geese fly North in Winter.


Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

I was a little mystified why the geese were flying North. Do you live in the Southern Hemisphere or is this just a route to a warmer place somewhere in Europe where the inner expanse of the continent will be colder in Winter than the shores? I loved your description and it is something I have watched many times also. During this pandemic, we have become very familiar with the wildlife in our garden deploying cameras and hunter cameras to capture nighttime movement and activity. This morning I was watching a magpie chase a starling fledgling right into the window from which I watched. The starling baby was so scared and anxious to escape he flew straight into the glass. The magpie was just about to peck him to death when I put my head right by the glass pane. The Magpie flew off and the starling fledgling recovered and flew off too. I then watched as another Magpie joined the first in full pursuit of the dazed youngster.

Your poem seemed calmer and more removed from the brutal realities I witnessed this morning, though the Winter cold brings its own challenges I suppose to the geese you described, flying across an icy cold, bare Winter landscape. It is not an easy life being a bird and there is a lot of drama in their world.


Mechanical issues

This was a freeverse and your rhythm was flexible.


Thanks for sharing.

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Review of Frustration  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (4.5)
You review me a lot and I thought I would return the favor. This poem is topical to me right now.

Reader Experience

It is frustrating not being able to help someone you love when they misunderstand your motives for wanting to help and respond in anger. But you know something needs to be done so not being able to help adds further to the frustration. But you can always pray.

Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

I stayed here because I am frustrated right now with a knee injury that is stopping me from running. I have been running every 2 days some 8 miles during this pandemic and I miss it. It is sunny outside right now and it is perfect running weather but I just have to sit here.

But your poem was less self-centered than my feelings of frustration. You are faced with a trouble that someone else has which you believe you can help resolve but they do not want that help. That is a frustration I can also empathize with. Some people resist all attempts at aid. I think it is a kind of pride and also confusion in them, sometimes it may well be that they do not believe my help is of any value to them. When people show sympathy to me I think they are joking. I never get sick and injuries are rare also. I am not used to being the recipient of others' compassion or jokes about my condition. It is strange and I find myself trying to debunk their real reasons for wanting to help. It is a kind of proud self-sufficiency that refuses the idea that help might sometimes be required. But it is wrong-headed and so I will see a doctor shortly and hopefully get some expert advice.


Mechanical issues

That was an alternate rhythm to the verses which given the structure jarred a little. Also noble does not rhyme with trouble.


Thanks for sharing.

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Review of A life  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (5.0)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button.
<Why should people listen to you, what is the hook here?>

Reader Experience

A story that starts in World War Two and leads us through struggles and adventures to Australia.

Commentary

Loved this authentic personal testimony. Like you, I am an emigree though my new country Germany was less a country that I wanted to live in so much as the home of the woman I fell in love with which I chose to return her to.

Your birth story was remarkable and reminiscent of the 'Call the Midwife' TV series my wife loves to watch which covers the time when the NHS was only just emerging. It sounds as though despite your mother's struggles with her business projects they and your grandfather's business acumen taught you a lot which you then put to good use. I have friends who also emigrated to Australia and indeed to the Perth area. They seem to love it there. It is a young land with a lot of opportunities to grow even more and a lot of space to grow into if they can solve the water problem. But as you say emigration is tough and especially so far away. It places a distance between you and your family.

You mentioned your grandfather walked into the North Sea at 99 in the middle of Winter and that people concluded it was suicide. I wondered at that. I have done similarly stupid things but not with any suicidal intent but just as a dare and test to myself. I went swimming in the Atlantic at night one January when there was snow on the beach just to prove that I could. It was a sort of mind-over-matter thing. So when I heard your grandfather's story I wondered if he was just repeating risks he had taken as a younger man to reclaim something of that glory and invincibility that is the arrogance of many young males. The difference being that he was no longer a young man doing that and so it killed him. I can see why people might interpret that as suicide but it is possible it was not unless he left a note to that effect. Sorry if that is presumptuous it was just the thought that your story provoked.

It sounds like you married well and that your marriage has been amazingly productive, tested by emigration and yet now with many children and grandchildren and a good lifestyle in your new counrty.


Mechanical issues

None I noticed, I was too absorbed in the story.


Thanks for sharing.

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Review of Doubting Thomas  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (5.0)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and was pleased to see I got a poem from one of my favorite authors.

Reader Experience

He prays, he doubts, is God listening at all? Is he talking to himself? Why does God often seem so distant? We just need to trust that after darkness there will be light.


Commentary

I loved the poem done in a saraband format I had never even heard of before. It is the content that arrested me. We all have doubts. Sometimes we doubt ourselves, sometimes God, and sometimes that we are doing it right when we try and reach out to Him. Different Christian cultures have mastered the silence of God in different ways. There are the ceremonial types who play out the traditional ceremonies and find God in the rhythm of the smells and bells, there are the biblicists who memorize Gods promises and cling to them, there are the rationalists who reason that God must by definition hear everything we say to Him and can respond in a multitude of ways which are for us to discern and that our very minds echo the divine since we are made in his image and we have enough of the Divine light to reason our own way. I find myself at home with all these approaches and also with the simple act of being with God in the silence. His presence need not be articulated in words at all, it just is and it centers, fills, and guides just by being so. Through many struggles and times of doubt, I have learned to simply trust as indeed your poem also concludes. We persevere because we must but also because He is, and will always be the great I AM.


Mechanical issues

None


Thanks for sharing.

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859
Review of Waterfall  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: 18+ | (4.5)
I am reviewing Quill award winners today and yours came up on the list.

Reader Experience

Leah Clearwater is a member of a strange group of Jacob Black’s ragtag rebel army of vampire guard dogs and werewolves. Prominent characters include Jacob Black an Alpha Werewolf, Alice a Vampire, Nessie who might be human but who looks like a blend of Vampire and Werewolf parties. The main story here is about how Leah meets Julie by saving her from a savage and unpredictable Vampire newborn who tries to kill her. Leah imprints on Julie and a lesbian love relationship is born.


Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

You write well and your style is engaging drawing the reader into the drama here. I did find the long list of names a little bewildering but the main characters stood out sufficiently for it not to be a major problem. Stylistically this is faultless and as an artistic piece, there is little to criticize here.

Regarding the content:

To accept this story I have to believe in werewolves and vampires and the folklore associated with them about newborns, imprinting, etc. Lesbianism is accepted as a rare but normal by-product of the imprinting process in this story. Since I believe in none of this and have a degree of incredulity about all of the content included here the fact that I read to the end is testimony to your writer's gift.

But as with other Quill Award winners, I have read today I am confronted with questions about the value of art versus moral content.

Leah as a mythical figure is attractive not only for her perfect curves and firm breasts but also for her protective instincts of humans and the employment of her powers in the service of weaker beings. Vampires that protect humans and use their powers to do so are also not as bad as the savage, unpredictable, blood-sucking monsters that the newborn in this story represents. So it seems you turn monsters into heroes and tempt the reader with a vision of an extraordinary team of gifted warriors using their gifts to protect humanity rather than parasitically drain it of its life force. So I did not find this utterly morally reprehensible as with some other stories I read today and in fact, it was quite engaging. That the strong protect the weak and the unwary appeals to me.

So I find myself in the rather strange position of actually liking a story about vampires and werewolves even though the very idea of these sounds ludicrous to me. Their current appeal to our culture can be explained in terms of talented writers like yourself telling dramas like that which make us sympathize and empathize with them.

Indeed the story takes the extreme of the newborn who just wants blood which I hate and sabotages moral and scientific objections to vampires and werewolves' existence with a story about this gang of protective bodyguards to humankind. I wonder therefore if your story is even more dangerous and insidious in that it reinforces the whole vampire/werewolf mythology by showing us such a morally sanitized version of it.


Mechanical issues

None.


Thanks for sharing.

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Review of The Aftermath  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: 13+ | (5.0)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and stayed for a masterpiece.

Reader Experience

Kara loved David until the hunters came.

Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

This is told from the POV of Kara an ancient vampire who fell for David an interesting and intelligent mortal she had fallen in love with. I have no love of vampires and yet you made me feel sympathetic towards Kara and even empathize with her last act which almost seemed self-sacrificial as a result. I loved the way you engage the reader drawing them into this final journey towards the seashore and the sunshine from the tragic memory of the night before.

For one brief moment, I forgot this was a blood-sucking monster that does not even exist and felt a connection with this character.

In my world, the hunters were the good guys even if they failed in their attempt to exterminate the real vampire here and only killed one lovestruck human. Kara should be the antagonist but you show your writer's gift by convincing the reader to side with her and make her out to be the tragic hero on the last journey of her long life, one motivated by love.


Mechanical issues

None


Thanks for sharing.

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Review of Lost Friend  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (3.5)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and stayed for the emotional drama.

Reader Experience

Shruthi rejects the advances of Arun a lifelong friend ending a relationship that was special to both of them but which Arun wanted to take in the wrong direction from Shruthi's POV.

Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

A woman can say no as can a man. But a yes and no equals a negative not a positive. Arun had to learn the hard way that friendship does not inevitably lead to sex and Shruthi had to hurt a lifelong friend to make her own feelings clear. She is probably right and there is no way back to what they had. After 20 years of talking you'd have thought they would have known each other better. Maybe this was a shock to Arun because Shrithi was clear enough when the first signs of his feelings started to manifest or maybe Arun was just blind to all the negative signals she was giving off about this direction.

I would say Arun was probably the bad guy here but in such situations, it is never 100% clear. The Indian-sounding names made me think about arranged marriages at the beginning. But maybe the younger generation of Indians have a different perspective on that kind of stuff and would not accept the irresistible logic of parental choices. Here it just appears to be Aruns choice that is being rejected. Since this sort of stuff happens all the time it sounds both credible and also a little obvious, there was no big twist here, it was just a girl saying no to a boy. I guess there are no dragons he can slay or mountains high enough for him to climb to win her affections back. The story just rejects him and labels him wrong-headed, there is no openness here to alternate endings, no second chances and so this story ends just a few hundred words after it begins.


Mechanical issues

This sentence has a few issues:

"Arun, you just ended the best thing we had". were the last word she had spoken to him
=
"Arun, you just ended the best thing we had." These were the last words she had spoken to him


Thanks for sharing.

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Review of Emerald Eyes  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (4.5)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and stayed for an amusing story.

Reader Experience

Emerald eyes, aka Majorca, was a beloved woman loved and appreciated enough to receive gifts of expensive jewellry. But where did all those jewels go? One day her lover receives a note that reveals all and explains the mystery.


Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

Oh, that was a shock ending and not a little disturbing. If a woman you love ends up either a lesbian or a man then that does raise some troubling performance issues. Apparently, the guy here was oblivious to the truth until Majorca aka Mark sprung it on him, in a remote and rather cowarldy way. So the protagonist is only guilty of blind and unappreciated loving while the antagonist stole his money and lied to him about her/his true feelings and identity throughout the relationship. One wonders if this change is ill-advised for someone who might not even be honest with themselves. The motive of Majorca seems selfish and manipulative and she uses the man to gain her ends. No sympathy for Majorca at all.


Mechanical issues

None.


Thanks for sharing.

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Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (3.0)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and it sounded wise.

Reader Experience

How a person takes criticism and rebuke illustrates their character. Just because your audience can handle the truth does not mean you should not be assertive and corrective in giving it.

Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

This is a sort of teachers mantra. That echoes the below verse(KJV: Proverbs 9-8-10).

8 Reprove not a scorner, lest he hate thee: rebuke a wise man, and he will love thee.
9 Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be yet wiser: teach a just man, and he will increase in learning.
10 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.

In a classroom discipline needs to be maintained and correction is not optional for students who cannot handle it or resist it, however incompetent or incorrigible they are. But in life it is clear that some fragile egos really cannot handle rejection or put downs even if they are deserved. Trumps election defeat in 2021 is a case in point. He could simply admit he lost, as all the courts and credible commentators have concluded, and move on. Instead he has made a test of loyalty for Republicans to accept that the election was stolen from him. It is human instinct to reject the bearer of bad news about oneself and especially if you know deep down they might be right. As writers on this forum getting bad reviews, or rejections from publishers, or despite all their best efforts not even placing in competitions this is topical advice. But incompetence does not have to be a permanent condition as you can learn to do better. Being a fool however probably sabotages all hope of progress so I think I prefer the bible version to yours here.

Even incorrigibility is an attitude that can be unlearnt with some patience making a person open to true understanding. Also a great many people set themselves over others and maintain that their standards and understanding is superior to those around them. But sometimes a degree of self reflection is required before pointing that finger. So I would also temper your words with the two extra proverbs contained in this text:

Matthew 7:3-6 (KJV):
3 And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
4 Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?
5 Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye.
Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.

Mechanical issues

None

Thanks for sharing.

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Review of In The Quiet  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (4.0)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and liked the sentiment.

Reader Experience

In the silence she meets with God.

Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

Loved the description of this private and intimate moment with the Lord. You marked out a space of peace and silence, relinquished worries and worldly concerns and waited for God, open to Him alone. In that quiet his presence is a warmth and a strengthening reassurance. There is absolute trust as you listen for the Master's voice.

Mechanical issues

The world outside my door, and all its worries disappears… - its refers to the world singular not worries plural. So disappears should be disappear.

My life, and hope is in his hands, and I feel no fear… no fear at all… - is should be are as it refers to a plural


Thanks for sharing.

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Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (4.5)
I found this while browsing at random it is a subject near to my heart.

Reader Experience

A Naturalist's presuppositions determine his answers. A Supernatural God cannot be proven by merely Empirical proofs that would by definition restrict Him to the realm of Nature. As then He would not be a Supernatural God. The Naturalistic perspective's focus on causation may sabotage its explanations as there is no way of differentiating inevitable predetermined utterances from true ones.


Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

Interesting and powerful logical refutation of the view that since God cannot be empirically proven, God does not exist. The extension of the scope of science into areas where it is not qualified to commentate has been a feature of the last couple of centuries to the point where it has begun to distort the culture. Aliens have replaced angels and demons in the popular consciousness. Since it can neither prove nor disprove God's existence the appeal to science as a rationale for unbelief is irrational. Only the preeminent credibility of science with the great medical, industrial, and military advances it has brought can explain the appeal to it in matters so far outside of its actual realm of competency. You focus on the illogical nature of the argument from the empiricism of the existence or nonexistence of a supernatural being. But actually, there are a host of other ways in which this could be done. I would suggest that the historical presence of Christ on earth was the most profound proof of the existence of God to all generations. Since that incarnation of the Divine into human culture and history accompanied by proofs of miracles and the resurrection, the nonstop rise and spread of the church is also secondary proof. Also, the continued existence of the Jews despite 3000 years of active attempts to wipe them out is historical proof of the existence of God and of His favor towards them. The union of Divine and Human in the Person of Christ reveals God to the fullness that He can be known and also provides a solution to the mystery of how God's revealed nature and the Book of Nature can coexist in Human life. We also, made in God's image, are living proof of the human transcendence of nature, we are more than mere animals and bring creativity and intelligence to this world that witnesses to a Creator as well as the processes of His creation. Attempts to make a science out of human beings can only go so far, dimensions of our thought life, languages, creativity, thought and capacity for love in the worst of circumstances testify to greater origins than the purely natural.

Mechanical issues

I found one small error in the footnotes:

I suspect that someday the behavior of these particles will be sown to have such a relationship = I suspect that someday the behavior of these particles will be shown to have such a relationship

Thanks for sharing.

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Review of Mayfly [169]  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: 18+ | (4.5)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and thought this had been unfairly rated.

Reader Experience

A younger man in love with an older man sits by a timeless river under ancient cottonwoods that have seen it all flow on by. Their love may not last, just like the short-lived Mayflies it appears as just a moment but it is their moment.

Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

Gay love poems could not be further removed from the kind of stuff I enjoy reading. But as an artistic effort, this was clearly worth more than the 3 stars you have received for it thus far. The temporary nature of the love may reflect the gay lifestyle as statistically, the number of lovers is usually greater and the relationships more temporary than with heterosexual ones. Here you portray an elder man who has seen many loves fail or lovers die. The pain of that moves the younger man to pity. The temporary nature of the Mayflies winged existence contrasts with the timelessness of the setting by the river and the cottonwood trees. Aside from the whole gay thing the age gap could be a source of disturbance to some I suppose. But you articulated the feelings here perfectly.

Mechanical issues

None worth mentioning.

Thanks for sharing.

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Review of Broken  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: 13+ | (4.5)
This is a Superpower Best Review Raid. I was browsing your portfolio for this year and this poem stopped me.


Reader Experience

The author begins determined to fling the last remnants of his soul at an ex-lover. But then reconsiders, she is not worthy of these gifts and he shall keep his eyes and his heart, for they will heal. But she will always be broken.


Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

It sounds deeply bitter, born of immense pain. The other was loved and yet betrayed that love. Highly dramatic he suggests he will tear out the heart that loved her and throw it into the mud. He will gouge out the eyes that looked upon her and in a mixture of salty tears and blood cover the path she follows out of his life with bitterness. But she is not worthy of the gift of a bruised heart or sad eyes. He will heal and he turns instead upon her with the realization that she will be forever broken.

This sounds like a person working through a bad breakup. It is expressed with the deepest passion and at the early stages of separation when there is no possibility of forgiveness or new love and new horizons.

Found it quite powerful and interesting.


Mechanical issues

No obvious mechanical issues. Though the bitter salt from the eyes sounded like tears. But if you gouge out your eyes you cannot cry anymore and just spew blood. So maybe you should have cried the bitter salt and then gouged out your eyes. Just a suggestion.


Thanks for sharing.

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Review of I HAD A FRIEND  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: 13+ | (4.5)
This is a Superpower Best Review Raid and your poem stopped me in my tracks.


Reader Experience

I had a friend at that moment I cannot forget. An American soldier firing his rifle. Looking for that friend that cannot be found. Caught up on a bridge there is blood on the ground. The friend I cannot see rescues me.


Commentary: Content, Characters and Plot

I was surprised to see that no one had rated this or commented on it as it was really good. This sounds like it is born of experience. It is heartfelt and powerful. I notice you served. It is a little ambiguous as to whether you are talking about a friend that died on that bridge saving your life or saved you from a bridge where you feared for your life. The title implies he is gone but does not tell us when. It sounds like a moment that you keep reliving in your mind again and again. One of those life-defining moments when you discovered who your true friend was and when you feared for your life. It is a moment of clarity and a milestone event.


Mechanical issues

There were no obvious mechanical issues with this poem.

Thanks for sharing.

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Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: 13+ | (3.5)
This is a Superpower Best Review Raid. I chose this piece to review because I am a fan of your fictional works but have not yet read any of your nonfiction.


Reader Experience

The author suggests that morality can be separated from religion. Non-religious people can act morally, non-religious reasons can be found for developing systems of morality and the hypocrisy of some religious people coupled with the exemplary behavior of some non-religious people makes his case.


Commentary

I have known people from just about every background and worldview in my capacity as a Christian church leader for the last two decades and in various outreach programs, street evangelism, and interfaith discussion groups. My jobs have also given me a variety of people types and experiences to draw on to discuss this issue. I also spent 10 years in university and bible college discussing these themes.

In response to your piece, my first question would be what is religion and what is morality? These are not properly defined here. The definition of Religion I will use to discuss your piece is of being organized response of mankind to God/gods. Morality is defined in terms of good behavior or a standard or goodness/righteousness lived out in practice.

Morality is distinct from Civil law which enforces communally accepted standards of morality but also entwined with it. Utterly immoral people can be constrained by the threat and sanctions of the Civil Law so it would be a mistake to say that morality was crucial to preventing anarchy. As with electric shock treatment in the famous experiment by Pavlov those who are little different from animals in their outlook can be kept to society's standards.

It is clear there is no global consensus on what constitutes true religion or indeed goodness/righteousness. Most of us can agree that murder is wrong for instance but our definitions may not include killing in war, capital punishment, euthanasia, or abortion in that category. 'Is there One God, many gods or no God at all?' is also a point of disagreement?

The Liberal response to this challenge of diversity is to set out a framework focused on the individual and his choices regarding what can be done and what can be allowed within this person's bubble of existence.
As a result, the diverse range of religions and moralities one could subscribe to are reduced to choices. We are free to pick a religion from the shelf or indeed mix and match and to practice whatever we create within our own bubbles of existence. Your piece appears to subscribe to this framework separating atheist and religious outlooks by the individuals who subscribe to these outlooks and then commenting on the individual hypocrisy or goodness of behavior of these individuals. However, in practice, many atheists subscribe to Christian morals without accepting these as such and many Christians behave as if there were no objective standard of morality so the lines between individuals regarding their moral behavior are very blurred. It is extremely rare to find an atheist with a completely worked out philosophy of existence which they live with total integrity nor indeed one who has answered all the big questions of our existence.

The basic question here is about the link between morality and religion. Required to submit a definitive answer you say there is no link. But you say for example that the Salem Witch trials and Inquisition are examples of obvious immorality by religious-minded people. In the case of the false finger-pointing of the Salem Witch Trials I might agree with you but still, ask the question as to whether the instinct to outlaw witchcraft was a false one. You show your Liberal credentials and basis for your own morality by suggesting that the violations of the rights of the individual here trump any overarching idea that witchcraft might be wrong and should be outlawed by the Civil authorities. In the case of the Inquisition also it is a Liberal choice to suggest that authorities cannot weed out heretics and false religion from society because we all have a right to believe whatever we want. The authorities of the time were more worried about the threat of Muslim nations and divisions undermining newly won national identities than about true religion even if they misused the name of God to enforce their wills. These were obvious examples of the abuse of religion for the people there at the time. You bring your own rose-colored glasses when you commentate on them.

There is a clear content link between morality and religion and things like the ten commandments, Justinian's Code of Laws, etc form the basis of much of Western understandings of morality today.

There is also the question of why be moral at all? Religion provides a good reason in the Abrahamic religions in suggesting a Judgment Day when we will be held to account for our actions. Hinduism suggests bad deeds in this life mean you might come back as a rat in the next. Even atheist world views like Marxism implied accountability to the collective and to the March of History. Modern Liberalism individualizes this accountability to the Self. But we prove to be quite flexible in rationalizing away our own sins even by our own standards. The effectiveness of Liberalism as a religiously held framework is highly suspect and the actual fruit has been moral relativism. If individualized morality is not as effective as for example as Sharia Law in keeping marriages together maybe it is not as good a moral system as even oppressive Islam provides. The Divorce rate and abortion rates in Liberal societies imply a collapse of morality in Muslim eyes and the failure of the worldview.

My own view is that people who regard themselves as righteous are generally kidding themselves as only God is good and none of us are righteous to our core. The real issue is how our collective immorality can be reconciled with a Holy God. Only Christianity really answers that question by providing the mechanisms of forgiveness and mercy on the cross. We can be regarded as moral creatures because of what God has done. Without his grace or mercy, our good deeds are nothing better than filthy rags.

Overall I know you only had a limited number of words to discuss this issue but I do not believe you even began to scratch the surface on it with this piece.

Mechanical issues

As one might expect with a writer of your caliber I did not find any obvious mechanical issues with this text.


Thanks for sharing.

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Review of Red With Regret  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: 13+ | (4.5)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and was intrigued.

Reader Experience

I thought this 'Blitz form' was an interesting exercise. The storyline of the poem was from bad choices, to repentance out into brightness and then a slippage at the end back to sin and darkness.


Commentary

Very creative and skillfully done. A guess it had to end badly writing in the dark genre but you could easily have ended it on a happier note with the restoration following repentance also. The repetition of the first phrase in a second line adds emphasis and nuance and was quite a powerful way to communicate the poems message.

Thanks for sharing

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Review of Galatea  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: 13+ | (5.0)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and stayed to read a really good poem.

Reader Experience

A woman grows into a writer, painfully, slowly, and methodically until the mask she constructs fits her face and she looked like one.

Commentary

There are some fantastic word choices here:
to let the ink flow from my heart

I was interested in the choice of

I wanted to be real
like Pinocchio or Pygmalion’s Galatea

These were carved out of wood and ivory and became real. And so you saw the endeavour of becoming a writer in the same way. A painstaking application of creative skill and then the result of a new look and a new life. This sounds very much like the Nietzschean ubermensch to me. The notion that we should aspire to create our better selves, breaking what came before and reforming it into a better and more powerful new self.

You spoke as if the writing of fantasy made you real which sounds strange at first read. I guess if you get to articulate those unformed and chaotic thoughts and feelings into a coherent narrative you do get to shape a form of reality that makes more sense than the chaos from which it originally came, much like Pinnochio or Galatea in fact.

This was powerful and insightful and I loved it.

Thanks for sharing

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Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (5.0)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and stayed because it made me laugh.

Reader Experience

Should you the writer be telling this story, or the characters you invented? The revolution has begun.


Commentary

The characters revolt against the author's intended ending and demand that he/she change it.

There are writers who invent their characters first and then create a story from the interaction between these personalities. There are authors who create a story and then invent characters to populate it. I guess when an author has invested enough time and emotion into one of their characters they start to have a life of their own and to make decisions that apparently contradict their original intent. This poem raises all the contemporary issues relating to telling and showing. Can we still have a God perspective and control on our stories and deliver intentional meanings with them or must they all subscribe to the individualistic moral relativism of the modern English Literature University department? Do we allow the dark sides of our characters to express themselves and rebel against the metanarrative we have placed them in or do we demand they succumb to the irresistible and inevitable storyline that leads them to their Judgment Day and stories end? Do we allow our characters to mess our stories up or make sure that our moral meaning is enforced?

Thanks for sharing this provocative and interesting piece.

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Review of Peaceful Handover  Open in new Window.
Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (4.5)
You asked me to review this.

Reader Experience

Some very well-designed software built to manage the complex French Train Timetabling program has put itself live. Should they resist the takeover by the AI they created or just milk the profits from it and turn a blind eye?

Commentary

It is a more likely scenario than Skynet's more destructive takeover in the Terminator franchise. It is a real fear in many people's hearts that AI is getting just a little too efficient. As someone who programs regularly, I have watched as tasks that took me 3 months to complete just 15 years ago can now be automated and customized in a matter of hours with some new cool tools. The .net framework with their code libraries, the Azure or AWS flexible subscriptions that adjust to usage and demand automatically, delivering the supportive infrastructure in hours (even minutes) not months all speak of an acceleration. integration and frightening new efficiency to our IT systems.

David comes across as the selfish Project Manager who just wants to get paid and does not want to think through the wider ramifications of what he is doing. He had a project, a budget, a schedule, and an anticipated profit. He does not get his bonus without the desired result. Chris the Data Scientist, seems more aware of the actual work and is raising the real issues. But like Wehrmacht soldiers just following orders allow the catastrophe to be unleashed. They are both passive bystanders to the new super actor the AI that is taking over the world's IT systems.

I loved the story and thought you grounded it quite well in the IT situation, but I cling to the belief that this cannot happen. There are several reasons:

1) No program however well designed can hack a system it does not have the passwords/security keys for. The idea that it used the developer's own credentials and their own remote access to the test server to work out that it was not on the live environment and then to hack into that live environment implies that they used the same credentials on the live system and had full authorization on it. In a project this size, I think there would have been a firewalled separation of development, test, and live environments. I suppose you could get around this by suggesting that the shallow, selfish project manager was taking shortcuts for profit and so not following normal procedures.

2) You talk about the AI having secured its global admin roles on the French Traffic System then hacking into other comparable systems to make similar efficiency improvements. Again the computing power and resources needed to break encryption keys would be noticeable to Data Center Managers and the accountants paying the bills for by-the-minute subscriptions. Also, there are considerable defenses in place around different national systems which have their own Cyber Warfare teams and indeed AIs working flat out to prevent this kind of scenario from taking place. In a battle between a private company and a state government, the state government will win as they have more resources. Even if the French government owns their traffic control system which is therefore somehow inside their network you would have the issue that the French are not in the same league as the British, Americans, Russians, or Chinese on Cyber Warfare.

3) State governments work with triplicate paperwork on many parts of their systems and large parts of it are not computerized. The bits are often on complete private LANs with no broader access. I know state officials who have dedicated PCs to surf the Internet as their own networks have no connection to it.

4) For all the hype about machine learning and intelligent systems, AI remains quite thick. A simple conversation with Alexa quickly reveals a limited set of precise commands which can respond to. She can follow simple routines and commands, she can calculate and she can regurgitate knowledge but she is not intelligent, able to read context and patterns and she is not sensually connected to what is happening around her except with sound. For the scenario, you suggest a program would have to be extremely large and utilize thousands of code library dlls.


I loved the last line:

it ended not with a war or disaster, not with the environment failing or social collapse, but with the trains running on time. but you should probably lose the 'a war' and replace it with just 'war' there.

You have chosen to write in British English which is fine since we invented the language. I put the article into my editor and Grammarly lit up. The issues are mainly to do with hyphens, commas, and spaces but you might want to apply that to the piece.


Thanks for sharing

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Review by LightinMind Author IconMail Icon
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Rated: E | (4.0)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and stayed for coffee.

Reader Experience

Is there devilment in a cup of Turkish coffee, does he who smells it care?


Commentary

I do hope Turkish coffee is not a symbol for something else in which case I have completely misread this. But assuming you are talking about a cup of coffee then I guess this one smells good. In fact it evokes feelings of desire. You suspect that it is about to scramble your brain with its delights.

Now comes the lines I do not understand

While I forget the goodness
that lies in people, in vain

If this cup of coffee is really bewitching then why would you care about the goodness in people? Why is this relevant? We have no larger context to grasp here to suggest that drinking a cup of coffee means opening the gates of hell and burying a crowd of good people under dark clouds of evil. So why would the desire to forget the goodness in people be evoked? If this coffee smells that good why is it not effective in banishing ALL thoughts of goodness, you say you forget the goodness in vain. Is this a secret doubt about the quality of the coffee or a lingering moral conscience that is not quenched by the hot liquid temptation?

If you clung to your own goodness in vain it would be more understandable, given the temptation of the Turkish coffee, but why does it matter to someone else's goodness if you drink or if you do not drink?

Thanks for sharing.

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Review of The Awakening  Open in new Window.
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Rated: E | (4.5)
Received this via the random 'read & review' button and stayed for a story on the important topical theme of race.

Reader Experience

A little boy Corey dreams of living in a white family. Maybe the white lawyer man will be his new dad..


Commentary

I grew up in a very multiracial environment here in Europe and the whole black-white thing in the USA mystifies many Europeans. The legacy of slavery seems hard to break and black people remain poor, badly educated, prone to crime, high illegitimacy rates, higher percentage of single mother homes and a deeply entrenched culture of victimhood. Yet I know highly educated and talented black people and by faith believe that all are made in God's image so the situation in the USA seems deeply wrong and an issue that needs addressing. Your story brings out many of the issues. Corey is ashamed of the poverty and flies he associates with his current home knowing that life with a white family would probably be better. He does not hate the people he is with but wants to save them from their circumstances. The woman has many children but there is no father around. Many black men are incarcerated by a criminal justice system that seems more likely to condemn a black man and give him a longer sentence. It seems that Corey has a mixed race background so might have been the result of a liaison with a white man by his mother, though this is not spelt out in the story. But the last comment makes no sense unless this is true. He thinks his whiteness, despite his dark brown eyes might have been his ticket out of there but actually neither whites nor blacks regard him as one of their own as a result. It is a toxic environment to grow up in yet still the mother has some dignity taking her children to church on Sunday. You captured the despair quite well and the angry distinctive language.

Powerful piece on an interesting theme. Thanks for sharing.


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