One Man Gathers What another Man Spills

Title: Heaven Lake
Author: John Dalton
Publisher: Scribner
Publication Year: 2004
Rating: A

John Dalton’s first novel places the reader with a young missionary in modern day Taiwan. Vincent traveled halfway around the world from the Midwest to Taiwan to teach English and spread the word of God. But his goal is harshly detoured when he indulges in a sexual affair with one of his teenage students. The affair forces him to take an offer from a wealthy businessman to go to Mainland China to retrieve the man’s future wife. What unfolds is a travel adventure into the depths of a curious country and an even deeper adventure into Vincent’s own relationship (or lack thereof) with his faith.

Heaven Lake causes the reader to constantly feel sorry for poor Vincent because of the predicaments he finds himself in. But this pity gives way to relief and pride in the young man because of his eventual shedding of guilt and acceptance of life without strict Christian guidelines. And the realism of the character – his ability to make mistakes (constantly) in love and in cultural misconceptions – is easy to relate to. His growth is apparent by the end of the novel.

At one of Vincent’s most enlightened moments, while he’s visiting Heaven Lake after his long and tumultuous journey through China, he contemplates a “lifetime of partial answers and shady intuitions,” a life without believing in Jesus. He came to the realization that “you could navigate your life without knowing” all of life’s answers. He concludes, “You could sometimes love the mystery as devoutly as the believers loved their gods.” This is a breakthrough for Vincent, who essentially viewed everything in life through the context of Christianity. Instead of focusing on what would happen in the afterlife, he learned to live his life.