Mike Cleveland’s The Living Bridge continues the sweeping saga begun in The Broken Bridge, drawing us back to the world split apart by the shattering of the ancient stone span across the Vitae River. This second volume narrows its focus to five broken lives in the months before Geshriel, the carpenter, gave himself as the keystone of a new living bridge. We meet Mary, tormented by demons of grief and despair; Lydia, stranded far from her family and branded an outsider; Matthias, the cursed builder crushed by guilt over his son’s death; Cleopus, a revolutionary consumed by anger; and Tamar, condemned by her own betrayal. Their stories unfold in three movements that build toward the moment when Geshriel’s love begins to transform both individuals and communities. The book blends allegory, spiritual reflection, and raw storytelling in a way that feels both ancient and startlingly present.

I found myself drawn in by the way Cleveland writes pain. He doesn’t dress it up or keep it at a safe distance. Instead, he lays it bare. Mary’s torment felt claustrophobic and heavy, yet it rang with truth about how grief can twist into lies we start to believe. Lydia’s yearning for her family carried me straight into her loneliness, and I felt her ache as if it were my own. The sorrow runs thick, and I caught myself needing to set the book down just to breathe. But that intensity is also its strength. It’s not a story of quick fixes or shallow hope. The book forces you to sit with loss before it shows you healing, and that honesty made the moments of light feel earned rather than cheap.

I appreciated the style of the writing. At times, it leans into bold, sermon-like declarations that give the story a sense of weight and authority. The message often comes through with such clarity that I found myself stopping to take it in, underlining sentences I didn’t expect to linger on. Phrases about love that refuses to let go or hope that survives silence stayed with me. The blend of allegory and character-driven narrative gives the book a unique rhythm, and when the two meet, the effect is powerful, striking straight at the heart.

The Living Bridge presses on wounds most of us carry in some form. But for readers who are willing to wrestle with grief, forgiveness, and the idea that love is stronger than death, it offers something rare. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys Christian fantasy with a strong allegorical bent, and to anyone who needs a story that admits the depth of human pain yet still dares to point toward healing.

Pages: 227 | ASIN: B0FX5WS62Y