So This is Like an Annual Tradition Now, I Guess (RB Vs. The Shadow God, Prologue) · 12:44pm Jun 25th, 2022

Hello, ladies. Gentlemen. Folks. May I call you my friends? Welcome back to my cabinet of horrors.

This is RB Vs., the blog series in which I unearth lost sins put to paper for your viewing pleasure and my masochistic fantasies. This is the third entry in the series; if you're new here, feel free to check out the previous two entries here and here. If you aren't new here, then you know what is to come, and I'm sorry.

The book we'll be taking a look at this time is The Shadow God, written by a mister Aaron Rayburn. It was published in 2005. Here's the cover:

Gotta love that font for the author's name. Really sells you on the quality of the product.

I originally wanted to review a different book by Mr. Rayburn, by the name of Spiritual Sorrow. His second book; The Shadow God is his first. I thought it would be more fair to look at a book written with some experience under the belt. Sadly, that book has been wiped from existance. There isn't even a preview on Amazon. All we have to go on for its contents are the book description and a few reviews, several of which call it the worst book ever written. Like this one:

Finally I can say with complete honesty that I have read the worst book ever written. It is impossible to imagine encountering a more poorly written and conceived book in the future. Impossible. There can not be anything else in print that could come close to this.

Incidentally, here's the start of an Amazon review for The Shadow God:

"Trapped under a beam with the countdown ticking away, the monster just on the other side of the battered door, and my friends are trying to free me, I look up at them and yell, "Go on without me. I'll be alright. I'll hold him off while you escape!" And my friends, because they know my sacrifice won't be in vain, make their getaway and when the monster breaks through just as the explosives go off, I know I died saving the lives of my dearest friends."
That pretty much sums up my experience reading Aaron Rayburn's novel, THE SHADOW GOD. I took one for the team, so the rest of you would NEVER have to be subjected to this beast. I beg you, don't let my selflessness be for nothing. Heed my warning. This is the worst book ever written.

Fun stuff.

Additionally, I almost didn't get to do this book. There's no ebook option for it on Amazon, or anywhere else you'd normally look. However, I was eventually able to track down an epub on the publisher's website (AuthorHouse, a vanity press). I paid ten dollars for it. They wanted my phone number before I could buy it, too, which is pretty scummy. I gave them a fake one.

Fun. Stuff.

It's from this website, actually, that we get the only piece of biographical information about the author:

This is Aaron Rayburn's first attempt into the world of Dark Fiction. He says there will be more to look forward to from him in the future. He's calling out to all movie producers to get this fantastical story in front of millions across the world. Mr. Rayburn resides somewhere along the Ohio River where he is at work on his second novel.

A mysterious figure, our Mr. Rayburn. I like how they used "fantastical" there, not "fantastic". Whoever wrote it must have really had a lot of faith in this book.

Without further ado, let's get this show on the road.

The first page past the table of contents is the dedication page.

This book is for my mother, Pam, who gave me the best childhood a kid could ever ask for. And, also, for my aunt Kathy, who never stopped believing in me.

Very sweet. It's immediately followed up by this:

And this:

And, finally, this:

Following those, we begin the prologue.

Now, as I have said before (and will continue to say well into the future), the first paragraph of a book is by far the most important. It needs to catch the attention of the reader, tickle their imagination, and make them want to keep reading.

Here's our fist paragraph:

Matt and Susan Johnson were having a baby, who would be their first-born. They had been married for nearly two years and finally decided they were ready for an addition to the family. Susan had wanted a child, since Matt and she got together way back in high school. At that time, Matt had told her that they should wait until their lives were on track before starting a family, which in any relationship was a smart move.

Dry exposition; not much to write home about, but not the worst thing I've ever seen. It certainly doesn't make me want to keep reading, but I don't get a choice in the matter, do I?

We learn that Matt went to college to be an accountant and Susan went to college to be a dental hygienist.

Now, they were well on their way to a prosperous life.
Or, that would’ve been true if Father Spiers hadn’t suddenly come into their lives. Father Spiers lived a simple life and was regarded by the community as a worthwhile religious leader. But there were some people who regarded him as a crazy old codger, who had weird and crazy religious campaigns. The latest: Are you ready to fight God’s fight?

That's what constituted weird and crazy in 2005, apparently.

Father Spiers is described as looking like Ichabod Crane, but with something not quite right about him. Matt thinks he's sneaky and probably hiding something. Despite this, however, the Father's sermons seem to be gathering him more and more followers. Accordingly, Matt distances himself from Father Spiers' teachings, and this earns him the ire of the town this is going on in, Portsmouth, which is described as being "nestled on the edge of the Ohio River", much like the book's author. Portsmouth, Ohio does exist, but it's a city. It has a website. It also has a slogan: "Where Southern Hospitality Begins."

In the small town of Portsmouth, a town nestled on the edge of the Ohio River, that was considered to be a blasphemy. Matt announced that that wouldn’t be a problem. In so many words, he told the people they could take the Father and shove him straight up a goat’s ass. That was when Father Spiers mailed an informal letter to Matt’s house declaring that without his blessing, their unborn child would be condemned to Hell.

On second thought, maybe it is the same place. That sure sounds a lot like southern hospitality to me.

Disregarding this threat, Matt and Susan have their baby. And then there's a knock at the door. It's Father Spiers.

Spiers paused before returning his gaze to Matt. He held up a white, waxen, bony finger and moved it back and forth. “He’s cursed,” Spiers hissed, his eyes wide and blue in their wrinkled sockets. They shifted back toward Craig. “Young Craig,” he said more to himself as if relishing the idea that the baby actually existed. Deep hatred fumed inside Matt. He wondered how Spiers knew his son’s name. Susan and he had kept it a secret.
“He will live a short life and experience a painful death, I’m afraid,” Spiers said, revealing his yellow, crooked teeth.

Matt then does what any responsible parent would do in this situation: he chases Spiers down and chokes him to death.

He couldn’t help but notice the severe shock that crossed Spiers’s face as he began to apply pressure. Spiers’s eyes popped extraneously from their sockets, as his face turned from a deep red to a sickly blue.

Ah, you see, our Mr. Rayburn has mixed up a word here. 'Extraneously' would come from the word "extraneous" which means either that something is foreign, or that it is irrelevant. I don't think 'extraneously' is actually a word, either. My guess is that this was thesaurused.

Matt continues to choke the man to death. The choke-ee manages to croak out some ominous last words: "The Shadow God is coming." He then dies, but surprise! It's actually an illusion, and Matt has just killed the doctor who delivered his son. This does not go over well with the hospital staff, who seize him.

And that's pretty much the prologue. It's eight and a half pages long, and mostly told through direct exposition. It doesn't grab the reader's attention so much as it fumbles at it, but we've seen worse.

That's all you get for today, folks. Look forward to more tomorrow.

See you then.

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