the Ship with Orange Sail: A Fantasy

THE CITY and her Great Men decide to send out the Ship with the Orange Sail, along with her crew of noble Volunteers, to spread the wonders of their own civilization to unknown lands. But what they discover is a civilization greater yet, a civilization of greater wisdom, greater achievement, greater faith. They are the Strangers.Andre, a midshipman among the Volunteers, returns to The City and soon marries Talitha, his loving fiancée. But he bears the sorry news that Talitha's brother, Marcus, a lowly seaman of the Volunteers, has stayed behind with the Strangers because he loved their culture more than his own. Moreover, Talitha is surprised to learn that Andre will leave The City, ostensibly to take up an official post in the new lands of the west. But his true motivation is a strange fear that he cannot explain to his new wife, perhaps not even to himself.For behind the Ship with the Orange Sail there soon arrives a ship from the Strangers, and aboard that magnificent vessel is their Prophet. This man comes ashore and preaches a series of fourteen sermons that praise The City and her people but also criticize and challenge them to escape the lies that would keep them from finding what is greater. This book follows the flight of Andre and Talitha as they travel to the west and reveals their necessary self-deceptions. More importantly, it captures the sermons of the Prophet who would teach us of Truth beyond knowledge, Goodness beyond morality, Beauty beyond art, and God beyond the gods.