Description
They wake and find themselves alone in a savage world where
dreams are tangible with no memory of who they used to be. Some find the world
dark. Others find it home. But all of them look into the dark uncertainty of it
and find themselves lost. For them, Becoming is a beginning, and it is from
this beginning that they each find themselves wandering a dark world looking
for some trace of their former humanity, if it was ever there to begin with.
Mahavir, finds himself conflicted between losing his own
life for the human beings that he despises or simply leaving them to die at the
hands of beasts and demons that their own minds have created. As he comes to
know Joseph and his father and Lila and her brother, he struggles to move away
from the fate that dreams have allotted to him and realizes that even the power
of those dreams cannot take away his choice. Regardless of the strength of the
nightmares that plague the world around him, he knows that it’s only his
decision that will determine the fate of men.
The Story Behind This Book
In order to edit my book, I called upon the services of my old friend Jim. What would follow, was a year of drunken belligerence, arguments, and drug induced rants. Our arguments were fueled by my need for "artistic expression" (i.e. not wanting to be wrong) and Jim's dogma of grammar and story structure (from years of school without ever writing anything). Topics ranged from how to simultaneously imply in the narrative themes of bestiality, incest, and infidelity, to the need for a good Taco. Near the end of our year long excursion into the bitter depths of my imagination, and truly testing the bounds of our friendship and sanity, I remarked to Jim, "I can't wait until this is over so that we can become friends again."
Praise and Reviews
It's a book that needs to be read again and again to first grasp its concept, and then to savour its almost poetry prose.
Marc Johnson tells a fine tale of humanity breakdown and survival.
It also has a fantasy twist to it with a cast of beasts and dragons so
fearsome you'd not want to turn the light out ever again! A fun book to
entice the childhood imagination back from the subconscious.
- L. Wise (Author of Eden)
This is a highly polished original first novel by USA writer Marc
Johnson. A fantasy adventure work aimed at adults, which examines some
basic human instincts and also dark themes along its way.
"Becoming" sets up a clever scenario and has the reader considering
the conclusion even from the outset of the novel. I feel that there
are echoes of Peter Straub where Johnson darts between the real and the
surreal and between the various cast's perspectives on the plot in the
early stages, despite some graphic and occasionally disturbing
narrative.
I'm glad I had chance to read this during my vacation week. I
particularly enjoyed Johnson's slick imaginative wordplay which he used
to good effect throughout.
- Steve Morris (Author of In All Probability)
In a classic tale of good vs evil, Marc Johnson takes a ragged troupe of
characters and develops them into the ultimate saviors of mankind. His
use of descriptors to help the reader tell the good guys from the bad
guys are varied. His "hero" troupe goes up against the "dark army of
the east". They are helped along the way by two shadowy figures known
as Michael & Gabriel (archangels?). Determining when this saga
takes place is left to the imagination of the reader. Is it our future,
our past or a parallel universe? Does it matter? In the confines of
the story, I don't think so. This book is action packed and full of
characters who are expertly defined throughout. You get to know them,
rooting for some; wishing others would just get out of the way. If I
had a problem with this book, it was being able to determine which
character was which, particularly in the battle scenes. There was so
much action, so many characters involved, it was hard to tell who was
where. It became even more confused when we had a good beast and a good
dragon enter the foray. But Marc ultimately cleared the skies for the
reader and brought his tale to an interesting "end". In a book that
asks more questions than it provides answers, I expected nothing less of
the ending than to do the same. A book that put me to mind of Stephen
King's Gunslinger series or what I know of The Lord of the Rings
Trilogy, I thought this was an excellent first novel by an up and coming
author.
- C.A. Morgan (Author of The Brothers Lewis)
My first impressions of Becoming by author Marc Johnson was that I was reading apiece of poetry.
Unsure of what is happening in the first pages, and of what is being
birthed, the mystery propels me into the 'lyrical poetry to keep a
close watch on the unfolding events. A man. A woman. Water. A birth. All
handled very sexual and very esoteric.
Flowing naturally with rhythm and rhyme, I could easily feel, taste,
and visualize all the descriptive uses of language and experience what
the characters were experiencing. A very tactile read, I was pulled into
the story further. The reading reminded me of some kind of Beowolf,
mixed with riddled words, yet fixed with clarity. Power and sensuality.
On the negative side there were too many he, his beginning sentences
and too many usages of it. If the author went over the pronoun wording
and applied more specificity as well as variant beginning for sentences,
the read would be more harmonic and sound less repetitive. But overall,
the poetic flow of the read helped me to overlook that fact.
Overall, this was a very inventive and uniquely flowing story. I
enjoyed the poetic prose and the unpredictable, twisting plot lines of
"Becoming."
-Ami Blackwelder (Author of The Hunted of 2060)