The Long Road: A Fable

By Mark Plattner

Frank Cooper was at the end of his rope: no job, no friends, no family, no purpose. After an encounter with the mysterious Wiseman he was charged with an impossible task. Now as the newly rechristened... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0595091695
• ISBN13: 9780595091690
• Release Date: May 2000
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Length: 144 Pages
• Weight: 0.48 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Wow, it was amazing!

I couldn't put it down! It was so amazing! Keep it comeing Mark! We all love your work!

I couldn't put it down

Lots of writers try to write fables, with Mythic Figures that embody Lessons for our Hero to Learn. But most of them fail. Either the different encounters with these Mythic Figures take on a certain sameness, becoming more and more pointless at the story drags on (think Harry Nilssen's "The Point"), or the lessons themselves are trite and too simplistic to mean anything (even though the Hero always acts like he or she has learned something life-changing)"The Long Road" easily skirts both of these pitfalls. Instead, the Hero is quite human, and has to struggle to earn the life-lessons of the book. And each Mythic Figure is unique, and fascinating in turn. The book never drags, never bogs down in its own metaphors, never thinks too highly of itself, and only rarely preaches. The surrealism of the landscape is a bit jarring at first, but you'll soon find yourself fully sucked into this realm of the fantastic. My hat is off to Mark, for succeeding so well with such a difficult literary form.

An Excellent Weekend Read

Take advantage of a weekend to read The Long Road. I had the fortune to do so after an extremely difficult week and found the book to be an excellent source for revitalization and regeneration. The moral of The Long Road is simple, and the complexity of Frank's journey illustrates in dramatic detail the "pit traps and dead falls" we create for ourselves when we let superficial gain impede our higher pursuit for spiritual satisfaction in the overall quest for happiness.Plattner's style creates a highly-readable book. The writing style represents a cross between Roald Dahl and Jack Kerouac. Characterization is a strong point as is dialogue. The careful reader will smirk on a number of occasions at Plattner's clever insertion of pop-culture references in his characters' dialogue.The reader who takes The Long Road for a spin over a weekend may look at the following Monday morning with an entirely new perspective on life.

Footprints

The Long Road mixes wonderfully descriptive writing with a wonderfully witty, entertaining and challenging fable. The story's protagonist doesn't only make a Seeker of us all, but also suggests our search may already be complete as we look at the foot prints on our own long roads. It is a quick read that doesn't end when the last page is read leaving an indellible mark on the reader.