Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
We live in an unequal world; that much has always been true, and it is to the detriment of all who give the world their finest smile and go through life with one simple aim, to give others the time that they inhabit with a reason to love.
Love, it is the most powerful of emotions, one that push us to achieve great things, to prove the impossible, one that will see us reach for the stars, and witness us Letting The Stars Go once we realise that all we have achieve goes beyond the sacrifices we have made.
There are thousands of writers to whom the world is denied their voice through circumstances, through the measure of another’s success, or from the truism of apathy on behalf of a nation, and if we are not careful, if we allow ourselves to walk down the highway of seeing books and stories as being separate from the author, then we ourselves have not just let the stars go, we have allowed them to dim, to fade away into the void of human creativity.
One such author, Liverpool’s Bob Stone, deserves to see his stars burn brightly, and on the back of a trilogy of superbly written Young Adult books, as well as acclaimed children’s tales, his first foray into the world of fiction for the more mature reader is one that is not only enjoyable, honestly paced, and able to bare heartfelt joy, it is one that confirms the suspicion that there is a hulk, a behemoth of writing industry behind the man, and one who deserves to be recognised for the Cosmos he has created in a novel that offers hope, that does not shy away from moulding the realism and the desire of a vision.
Letting The Stars Go sees Bob Stone take a giant leap in his writing career, and it shows with the beautiful narrative he has set out for the readers to embrace.
If the world is tilted off balance with the way it sees fairness of opportunity, then the way it has installed into us all that a piece of art means nothing unless it fits a certain degree of violence, of sexual expression, of having a twist so unfathomable that it makes the soul bleed and the mind express confusion, is to be honest more than ungracious, it is a by-product of our own inability to grasp that sometimes a tale is a reflection of the author’s heart, and in this case, the heart is enveloped with a style of grace and image that is boundless in its energy and description.
Bob Stone has evolved, shaken off the ground belief placed in the mind of all artists that the world cannot accommodate the person, and produced a book of beauty and intrinsic value. Letting The Stars Go once they fall to Earth and in the palm of your hands is difficult, but when you have appreciated their beauty, they must be shared with all, lest the power goes out.
A significant and vital step taken for the Liverpool author, and one the reader will be honoured to walk alongside.
Ian D. Hall