Due to the vast amounts of recurring themes in medieval fiction, I tend to be suspicious of the genre. It seems to me that most authors cannot write in this vein without either imitating J.R.R. Tolkien or pulling in King Arthur somehow. Because of this, I read most of The Dark Faith by Jeremiah W. Montgomery with an expectation that elves would jump out of nowhere and ruin the story’s originality. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the story mostly maintained its originality while pulling me into a world that needed no Balrogs or awakening kings to keep my attention.

However, several flaws tarnished an otherwise pleasant read, particularly the predictable storyline. Unfortunately, the novelty of the book’s subject only partially made up for a fairly conventional plot.

Montgomery’s world is full of small city-states, marauding barbarians and monasteries, and I found it strongly reminiscent of Britain during the fall of the Roman Empire, even down to the map at the beginning. The established church in the story obviously parallels early Christianity, and some of the barbarian deities are only letters away from names I had seen before in mythology.

Morumus, the young protagonist, is a warrior-monk charged to translate Holy Writ (their scripture) into a barbarian tongue. However, his task soon diminishes in importance as an ominous menace emerges to threaten the church.

Morumus’s journey begins with a nightmare that ends with his death. Puzzled, he speaks with Abbot Grahem, his superior at the abbey where Morumus lives. To his surprise, Grahem informs Morumus that he must accompany the abbot to a meeting of various church authorities in a faraway country. There, Morumus is to join a recent barbarian convert and begin translating the Holy Writ to the language of the northern barbarian tribes.

Early in their journey, Morumus and the abbot discover a man murdered under suspicious circumstances. While I saw this as an opportunity for Montgomery to accelerate the plot’s pace, the story instead moves to a flashback of Morumus’s childhood.

In this extended flashback narrative, Morumus and his father, who is apparently a king of a small country, ride with a warband to investigate a raid. This raid, apparently perpetrated by one of their allies, is a serious threat to the kingdom.

After dark that day, when the company sets up camp, Morumus leaves the encampment to get a drink. While he is outside the camp, a group of shadowy figures attacks the encampment. The soldiers sound the alarm, but they are incapacitated by a strange music produced by their attackers. Morumus, outside the camp area, is safe, but he is forced to watch as his father and the other soldiers are slaughtered. After a while, Morumus is released from his paralysis.

Following the flashback, the story jumps to the end of his journey. Morumus begins to teach two barbarian converts Vilguran, the language of the church, in preparation for translating the Holy Writ. However, his work is interrupted by a mission assigned by Grahem. He is to learn about a mysterious new order of clergy known as the Order of the Saving Blood.

At the same time, the barbarian practice of human sacrifice is being revived-the sinister Dark Faith. This ancient cult is connected to a series of abductions and murders around the country. Morumus soon finds himself trapped in a conspiracy that has advanced far beyond anything he ever imagined.

As far as plot goes, that is all I can tell you, because the story’s predictability makes the plot twists fairly obvious from that point on. In many ways, the story insulted me, since Montgomery often went to great lengths to explain almost every aspect of the plot.

While some of the novel’s surface ? level dynamics were clever ? they were almost over-clarified. I enjoy figuring things out for myself, and this novel allowed none of that. The only possible excuse is that the shallow plot is all that is observed by the vaguely clueless Morumus.

Only one element of the plot surprised me to any degree, and unlike the rest of the story, Montgomery presented it with relative adeptness. Occasionally, the story would switch to the proponents of the Dark Faith, particularly a young priestess figure, named Urien, who is involved in the ceremonial human sacrifices required by her religion. She is a much more believable character than Morumus, displaying genuine doubts and fears.

Usually I find any exposure of the enemy to be a sign of weak writing; I feel that suspense is stronger if the antagonist’s plans are uncertain. However, these few scenes were well done. Ultimately, Urien must choose between the Dark Faith, which is all she has ever known, and the faith of Morumus and company.

Despite the predictability of the story, The Dark Faith presents a tolerable story of good versus evil and would probably be worth reading by fans of fantasy or medieval fiction. However, if you prefer other genres, this book will not persuade you to change that view.

The book is the first in what will eventually be the Dark Harvest trilogy, and I remain hopeful that the latter two books will be improvements. The Dark Faith runs around 350 pages, and is available on Amazon for about ten dollars.

For more book reviews, read the Sept. 21 article, Action-filled fiction enthralls readers with suspense.