Outlaws of Time: The Legend of Sam Miracle, Book 1
Outlaws of Time: The Song of Glory and Ghost, Book 2

I wrote of the first two books in this series that they were confusing, violent, headache-inducing, and fascinating. I want to like Mr. Wilson’s series about a boy named Sam Miracle and his sidekick(?) or maybe companion(?) or maybe better half, Glory Hallelujah. I want to understand or even just appreciate the books. But I just can’t keep up. And I can’t decide if that’s my fault as a reader or Mr. Wilson’s failing as a writer.

This third book is about the fall and rise of the son of Sam Miracle and Glory Hallelujah, Alexander Miracle. I think. Or maybe it’s about a Korean American girl named Rhonda who learns to be brave and walk through darkness. Or maybe it’s about how Sam and Glory sacrifice themselves to save their son.

The thing is N.D. Wilson writes delicious prose. His sentences are at times mesmerizing. Examples:

“Darkness wasn’t possible with smooth blankets of snow on every horizontal surface, and jagged rime frost armoring every pole and wire and fence post. Light, any light, bounced and bounced and lived on in such a white winter, but it also arrived in stillness, with none of the traffic and chatter of day.”

“And when she and Sam were deep in that oily and foul nothingness, she even sang. And while it helped Sam’s memory when an unbroken song straddled two different times, he knew that Glory didn’t just sing for him. She threw her voice through that outer darkness as a call to the ones she had loved and lost, and she hoped they would hear it, and know her voice, and be stirred.”

“It was like a magic beanstalk of flame. How high could it reach? Where was the ceiling in this place? Would it walk away like a tornado or would it sit here growling until there was no more oily air to burn? And how long would that be? He could see tendrils of darkness being swept up in the cyclone, slithering across the stone floor and groping through the air like his own hands had been only moments ago. The spinning inferno slurped it all in as it grew.”

See, the man can write. He’s definitely got the word picture thing going.

But . . . I have time travel whiplash. And Death keeps happening in these books, but it gets undone, or something. People go back in time and die over and over again, but they manage to change the timeline. And they don’t die or they don’t stay dead? So. what use is it to try to kill the villains in the piece if nobody really stays dead? On the other hand, it seems as if some of the villains are really, truly dead and gone. Have I mentioned that I’m confused?

If you’re going to read these books, and if anything I’ve written about them intrigues you and even piques your curiosity, I’d recommend that you read them in order: The Legend of Sam Miracle, The Song of Glory and Ghost, and then this one, The Last of the Lost Boys. I don’t know if this book is the last in the series, or if there will be another book in which Sam’s and Glory’s son, Alexander, learns to travel through time and “wield power without rage.” But the ending does leave the latter possibility wide open.

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This book may be nominated for a Cybils Award, but the views expressed here are strictly my own and do not reflect or determine the judging panel’s opinions.