I didn't mean for A Man At Arms to be my second Lent book. It just happened.
Steven Pressfield is one of my favorite authors. If you're a fan of historical fiction, as I am, his books are one-stop shopping. So when I heard him interviewed recently about his new book, naturally I wanted to add it to my reading list.
I bought the novel last Saturday, exactly one week ago. My plan was to save it for after Easter. The trouble, as I am well aware, is that I'm unable to buy a Pressfield novel and "save" it; I've got to start reading it immediately. I told myself I would just see how the first chapter unfolded before moving on to St. Teresa of Avila's Interior Castle, which was on deck as my second Lent book this year.
By the end of Chapter One of A Man At Arms, I knew St. Teresa would need to exercise her saintly patience with me. I swallowed the novel whole, reading it throughout the weekend. Monday started a work week, but I took advantage of Daylight Savings to keep reading after logging off my laptop each evening. I finished the book on Thursday, but I'm still thinking about it. It's the kind of story that leaves a mental and emotional residue that must be pondered and processed away.
I reassure myself that devouring the story of Telemon of Arcadia, a first century former Roman soldier--a mercenary--who becomes embroiled in a clandestine quest to smuggle one of St. Paul's letters from the Holy Land to Corinth, was a worthy Lenten endeavor. Perhaps it was; but I enjoyed the book far too much for any creditable sacrifice to be applicable. I'm now slogging through the lofty, mystical, challenging Interior Castle. Even as I struggle to comprehend and learn from St. Teresa's intricately imaginative descriptions of the human soul as a seven-chambered diamond, I'm wondering at which level Telemon would be.
The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.
