Years ago, I read a great novel by Mark Sullivan, called Beneath a Scarlet Sky.   One of the best I’ve ever read, I highly recommend it.  I wrote about it almost exactly seven years ago: https://mikevargamusings.com/2017/10/09/beneath-a-scarlet-sky-an-incredible-story-of-a-hero-and-tragic-love-loss/ 

Since then,  I haven’t read anything further from this author, because I naively thought nothing could improve upon this tale coming out of World War II.  A hero with an incredible story of survival, and tragic love loss.  Such a monumental experience.

But I was looking for something new to read this last month and realized he had another WW2 survival true-story published, The Last Green Valley,  and I decided to give it a go.   Wow, what another masterpiece in storytelling by Mr. Sullivan!  A story of extraordinary adversity.  A real-life family, caught between the prevailing evil of Stalin, and Hitler.  A story of trial, of suffering, grit, and yet the story of a dream of a future, of a Last Green Valley… Achievable by determination, by chance, or as expressed in the writing, a faith and trust in God.  A faith which is constantly tested. Sometimes this is expressed as the notion of a power in the universe for which we can be one.  It makes one believe there is a way with faith and determination and positive outlook to survive in the most evil and trying of times.  Finding a path toward a better future.  Along the way, the author contrasts between those who embody this faith, may have lost it but find it again, as well as determination and persistence, from those who seek their own temporary advantage.

I will not retell the story here, but I leave you with my impression, and to suggest if you liked Beneath a Scarlet Sky, then give The Last Green Valley a read.

Faith

Is as spherical thing
held and felt with an infinity
of possible sides, it will
roll with you or away from you,
it will challenge you to keep up,
it will seem elusive even when
you need it most, and yet it keeps
rolling.

It is tested, as your connection
and oneness with everything
and each other is tested, and
in such times it may grow or
shrink as you see the future
and your participation in it
obscured, but it keeps
rolling.

It will be your companion
if you allow it, rolling before
you, opening new doors, if you
treat it with innocence and wonder.
If you see it in the smallest
things, it will be there for the
biggest things in time, still
rolling.