Using the metaphor of the door through which we are welcome to find out more about the everyday life of our savior Jesus Christ, Kenny Kemp fictionalizes three stories from the New Testament: "The Prodigal Son," "The Good Samaritan," and "The Talents."

The scenes he crafts are often poignant and tender revelations, answering questions about how it might have been. For example, when the carpenter Jesus (called Jeshua in the novel) builds a door for the father of the prodigal son, he reveals his awareness and love for children in enlisting the help of young Arah as an apprentice. There was interesting psychology in this scene. The rhythm of dialogue and language was good. Kenny Kemp can write.

Kemp is sensitive about the rebellious prodigal brother, never painting him as evil or fully lost, so that the forgiveness of the father is natural. The irritation of the older brother was also redeemable. The plot of the talents is clever. The bucket brigade in the building of the well is the kind of memorable, page-turning fiction I would like to see more of in the rest of the book. Also, there are scenes in the Good Samaritan story that are very interesting. Kemp has done his homework in his discussion of the technicalities of construction, travel, food gathering and serving.

However, the major difficulty with the work is the lack of focus on the development of one or two people who will carry the plot forward. There are three "plots," and the only character who is developed throughout the work is Jesus, who is so good that he cannot furnish us much conflict of character. Conflict is what gets us to burn the midnight oil, and the conflicts are pretty short-lived to generate long-term interest. No strong book-length antagonists are present. In fact, there are so many people in these stories that it is very difficult to keep track of them!

I read this work and the national best-seller THE RED TENT together. Both novels dramatize stories from the scriptures. If I had time, I'd read and compare Taylor Caldwell, who was one of the earliest authors to Biblically elaborate. And she established what soon became an almost cult-like following when she did it. This kind of story-telling has always been popular. THE RED TENT's fascinating first-person development of Jacob and Leah's only daughter Dinah absolutely sucked me in because of the intimacy I felt with the story-teller.

I'd say Kenny is capable of doing what he hopes to do here. But if he focused on the development of fewer characters, the book would have been much more satisfying in my opinion.

Marilyn Brown