Offerings

Stewart Felkel has written a novella that has an interesting enough premise. Tommy McCain is a former FBI agent who is settling down for retirement in a small town. He chose Louisiana, because one of his friends has said how much he loved it there. In fact, his friend even moved there himself and was living there happily. That is, until he disappeared. Twist?

Tommy's character was likable enough, although I felt like the short length of the story didn't do him justice. It's evident that Tommy has a lot of history behind him. There are moments where it's all just too much for him and he feels it crashing down. Despite the length, I would have liked to get to know him a little better. Even the mythology that is presented is rushed over. It was this mythology that really drew me in, but as soon as I had my interest peaked it was over.

What I did appreciate was the vivid characters that populated the town. Stewart Felkel has a knack for writing uniquely vibrant characters. I mentioned above that Tommy was a great character. I just would have liked to see him pop off the pages as vividly as the characters around him. His quiet nature sometimes made him blend into the background, even though he was the main character.

The other issue I had was that I felt as though the length of the novella wasn't utilized as well as it could have been. There's a lot of day to day happenings that fill the pages. Tommy waking up, putting on his clothes, making coffee. I can understand trying to humanize him and make him real. However I think a bit of that probably could have been cut in favor of some more buildup to the finale of the story.

There were also quite a few typos in the copy I read. That wasn't enough to push me away from finishing Offerings but I could see this being much better with a little polishing.

I understand this is a novella, and I thought this was a quick, and interesting enough read. I honestly think that with a little more length and some editorial work, it has the potential to be something amazing.