A Powerful Story, An Elegant Style…And
Some Discord Between Them
Miro boasts a compelling
plot. An occupying army brutalizes a
nation, some of the conquered trying to become invisible to their oppressors to
make a living…or even joining with them.
Some resist in secret, hoping to eventually throw off the bonds of
tyranny. Still others just try to
survive. Miro and his companions – the
Captain, Alex, Aidan, and Markus – are part of the latter group, imprisoned and
tortured for nine years until events give them a second chance at freedom. And be forewarned – some of this action is
intense and brutal.
But
even as powerful as this storyline is, it is the prose that sets Miro apart. The book is elegantly written, the scenes
evocative, the characters nuanced. It
explores some of the extremes of human existence that can only be found in the
hostile and unforgiving setting of war – courage, betrayal, brotherhood,
hope. Clearly, words are the friend of
author A.E. Nasr.
In
places, there is some discord between style and story. With such evocative prose, the transitions
from thought to reality can blur easily.
More than once I found myself returning to an earlier paragraph,
realizing that what was being recounted was not a dream, not the demon of a
former battle or the fantasy of an earlier time, but events in the here and
now. Some of that intertwining of real
and imagined may have been intentional – a character’s past influences how he
reactions. But at other times, it seemed
that a transition was missing, resulting in my pause.
Overall,
melding the ‘nuts and bolts’ of action and the elegance of literary fiction is
not an easy task. With only few
exceptions, Miro does it extremely
well.
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