Review of Water Walker by Ted Dekker

I’m a Dekker fan; I’d go so far as to say his writing has influenced my own. So I jumped at the chance to review, Water Walker, the second book in his Outlaw Chronicles series. For my review of the first book in the series (Eyes Wide Open), click here.

Like Ted’s other stories, the story concept is original. Ted does a good job of writing what I’d refer to as allegorical-type stories. I think this type of story might appeal to someone who is a seeker or is de-churched (that is, they’ve attended church before but no longer attend). I wished that at the end, there was some discussion to guide readers toward Ted’s intended point (maybe included at the end of the book). I think Christians can see the themes easily, but I think a guide would be nice for seekers.

The story starts out with a young girl named Alice who does not remember the past six months of her life and has been placed in a foster home. A man shows up claiming to be her biological father and wants to kidnap her; he tells the girl her name is Eve. Alive/Eve must decide who she can trust. A shadowy figure known as Outlaw appears and shows Alice/Eve she can become a water walker and that her body is just a costume. Like I mentioned previously, I think that many Christian readers will easily identify Christian themes in the story.

What I didn’t like was the way POV was handled. I think Ted is sort of a maverick when it comes to POV. For Immanuel’s Veins, I noted that he switched back and forth between chapters using first and third person. Ted also mixes things up a bit in this story as well. I felt like it worked in the other book, but for this one, I felt like POV could have been deeper. At least one shift could have been handled better with a scene break, at least in my opinion. Also, in my opinion, I felt it was odd that a character had lost their memory, but then a chapter or two later, recalls something from the past casually, but doesn’t find this odd that they suddenly remembered something. Maybe it was supposed to be written that way, but it felt like an “oops.” I’d also like to note that a curse word was used, and it really didn’t need to be. I understand going for realism, but realism is different than literalism (see post by Author Donn Taylor for more discussion on this subject). I get that the character would swear, but an author can show this without using the literal term that a character would use.

*Please note that I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my review. However, I was not required to write a positive review. The opinion expressed here is my own.