Encountering Cheryl Moore - Her Art, Her Words... A Review...

Her Art, Her Words




Cheryl Moore













Encountering Cheryl Moore through her art and her words is like coming into direct contact with our feelings, our emotions. Hers, yours, those of her characters! Like a swimmer that had somebody come up from below and pulled me under, I feel submerged--drowned in the words and visual sights that exist thousands of years into the future. I have visited the time period 3987 through 4020 and met many fascinating people in countries such as India, China, Poland and the Sahara Desert...and even visited a prison ship, a Floating Asylum.


And you can too! I highly recommend you click the title of this article when you've finished reading and start following Cheryl Moore' blog! Cheryl is the author of a new series entitled, Unbound Boxes Limping Gods, which at present has not yet been published. I'll be privileged to read the first manuscript, so look for my review of the novel in the near future. Even if you never read the novels, however, you will find a treasure-trove on Cheryl's blog! Using what she terms micro-stories, Cheryl presents each of the characters appearing in her novels. Her art is original, unique and strangely beautiful, even in those that depicts characters that are flawed, affected by the grim lives they've lived or, sometimes by what other characters have forced them to bear. I admit that, at this point, her artwork pulls me in more than her words...but only because I want more of her words!

Alexand is the main character and, admittedly, Cheryl's favorite. Her picture above shows Alexand after she has been released from The Floating Asylum. Obviously affected by that trauma, she has withdrawn from her family, even while there at home with them. Before she has fully recovered, however, her husband is murdered and two of her children are kidnapped! Using what she terms, disconnected stories, Cheryl introduces each of her characters to readers of her novels. I followed a part of Alexand's story chronologically on my blog this month. For me, the glimpses were so enticing, that about midway through the month, I started hinting about reading the novel! Tragedy, often grim, terrible acts are presented. Or the sorrow and love of a husband, trying to help his wife recover from unbelievable trauma and depression, is provided. The stories are taut, precise in wording and full of such emotion that readers are captured immediately, no matter what particular life story they have entered.

I hope you have already read my interview with Cheryl that appeared yesterday. She talks about how she entered the world in which she now feels so much a part of her at the early age of 17! Her intimacy of this world is revealed in each story and drawing she shares with her followers--it is provided with love, tenderness and an awareness of humans that I have not seen in the work of many writers. Her ability to complement her characters' image in art is a truly fascinating addition, but it is clear from her words that she not only loves the world she has created, but craves to introduce her world and the characters to each of us so that we may come to know them as she does. Whether she achieves that in her novel is yet to be seen, but I can guarantee that if you begin to read her micro-stories, you will develop a "taste" for the world where limping gods live...

With a touch of the supernatural, fantasy, and futuristic science fiction, Cheryl Moore's fiction falls into the speculative genre. It is clear from her micro-stories that Moore cannot be pigeonholed--she stretches the boundaries of this world and takes them into a future that perhaps is not totally plausible, but created within a scientific framework of imagination that results in readers' believing that, for her characters, anything is possible. Dean Koontz has the same intensity, but rarely writes series, so that readers don't achieve intimacy and connection... I have read only one other author that competes with Moore in this regard...Ruby Moon-Houldson's Guardian Series, with over 10 novels, constantly blows my mind with the scope of creative genius she exhibits. I have every confidence I have found another of her ilk in Cheryl Moore!

Readers, if anything about Cheryl's work interests you, it is my recommendation you start watching! This author is "setting the standard" for books of speculative fiction and the use of graphic complementary imagery to accompany fiction novels in the future. She is only prevented by the limitations of today's computer graphics capabilities... In my opinion, the future holds nothing but "possibilities" of how Moore's books will reach readers... hopefully long before circa 4000 where we'll find Unbound Boxes Limping Gods!

Mother's Land

Characters from left to right: Ancille Merevija, 

Alexand Merek, Samuel Merevija and 

Eldenath Balsara. (Takayama, Japan 4041)

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