Review of Always Before Me

[Davison Nzembe]

[Following is a volunteer review of "Always Before Me" by John Servant.]

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4 out of 4 stars

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A Catholic priest is seen lying dead in the prison yard. He has been stabbed by one of the prisoners who have ganged up against him for preaching and teaching the word of God in prison. The priest had been imprisoned for refusing to give evidence about a murder suspect named Blood who had killed a cop and his wife and was arrested. After the murder, Blood had come to church and confessed to Father Paul for killing a cop and his wife. Father Paul feels he should save the young murderer’s life and even suffer for him just like what Jesus did to the world. As such, Father Paul does not release any information about Blood killing the cop and his wife when called by police for interrogation leading to him being imprisoned for willfully refusing to release important information about Blood concerning the murder. Even so, Father Paul holds preaching and mass sermons in prison. Father Antony is another Catholic priest who is a prison chaplain. He was transferred from being a priesthood teacher to a prison chaplain after being falsely accused by a girl from his class that he made sexual advances to her. That girl, now a woman and is suffering from cancer. She goes to Father Antony and asks for forgiveness for the false sexual advance claims she made against him. The priest forgives her and deeply feels pained by her cancer illness and starts praying that God removes the cancer from her and transfers it to him. God fulfills his request and the woman is healed but Father Antony is attacked by cancer and dies. His coffin is laid in the prison yard in preparation for the wake procedures and that marks the end of the book.

Always Before Me, is a book presented with perfect writing skills. The flow and logic of proceedings of events coupled with the proper staging of characters at appropriate intervals and the subsequent incidents is just sweet. In turn this continuously draws curiosity to read further with the desire to know more of what happened later on. The first sentence on the very first chapter, Chapter 1, starts by a puzzled shout from one of the guards who called upon Father Paul after seeing him lying down and dead in the prison yard. This Catholic priest is the main character in the story. The reader will have him more than often throughout the book only to get to an abrupt end in suspense, and sending the mind to curiously thinking about what really was the end of Father Paul, only to realize that the curiosity arousing first sentence of Chapter 1 is the end of the main character’s life and the story. Thus, the evil plans that involved many of the prisoners, and even those who had looked repentant to the priest’s teachings including some prison authorities, the evil plans about killing the man of God because he chose to fear and respect only God and not fear men, was certainly fulfilled in the first paragraph of the first Chapter of the book. I really liked reading John Servant’s book and it has actually raised my spirit in the understanding that troubles to people who love God can be used by God to raise their spirit and put them closer to Him if they remain obedient to him.

Throughout the whole book I have not noticed anything needing correction that I may need to comment about. Instead, I can just say Always Before Me, is just one of the best fiction novels about Christian faith.

On the rating of this book I can freely rate this book 4 out of 4 stars.
The book is just completely interesting and neatly written. There are no grammatical or typing errors.

I recommend this book to people who want to read and learn more about a Christ like character. Father Paul and Father Antony really resemble a Christ like character in this fiction novel.

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Always Before Me
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