The Mystery of the Word is not your typical Christian book, certainly not your typical Adventist book. Each of the six pieces of fiction is followed by a sort of explanation/exploration of the story. As a writer, I found the book fascinating.
The stories have a mystical quality that stretches the mind around seldom-pondered themes. This is the book's merit, aside from the author's storytelling abilities.
I found myself abruptly and painfully in two of Mason's characters. There's a bit of A. B., a character in The Ghost of Christmas, in most of us Adventists, and his gentle victory over a consuming passion for proselytizing is one of the sweetest passages in Christian literature.
It's unfortunate that the author felt it necessary to explain his stories, but for the Adventist who rarely reads fiction, the explanations will undoubtedly prove helpful. Mason tends to defend his use of the fictional medium a bit too much, citing often the parables of Jesus.
The book, while rich in symbolism, remains rooted in reality. Sometimes the morals are spelled out for us, other times they are oblique and left for readers to discover on their own.
Mason has written a careful, reverent book that provides glimpses into our shaky humanity and the demands we are called upon to meet.
