William Jensen's dystopian novel CITIES OF MEN is a dark and emotionally-charged tale about a mother who simply disappears and leaves her son and husband with only a cryptic note stating "good-bye, I've gone off on an adventure." Cooper, her 12-year-old son is devastated after coming home from seeing a movie with his father Percy and discovering his mother Arden gone. Percy doesn't seem to be bothered by it, however, assuring his son that she has done this before and will likely return soon. Cooper then finds his mother's high school diary in which she alludes to a land that she grew up in being a desert in more ways than one. This is seen by Cooper as being a possible clue to where she may have fled to. It isn't until a week or two goes by that Percy makes the decision to take Cooper with him and search for his missing wife. Percy, a Vietnam vet suffering from PTSD, is battling his own demons and these often influence his behavior in erratic and unpredictable ways. As the two embark on their journey to find their wife and mother, they travel through California and Arizona encountering many strange circumstances. The sense of foreboding that begins to settle in on the narrative is very ominous and one gets the feeling that the ultimate discovery at the end of the journey will be anything but pleasant or happy.

CITIES OF MEN was one of the most difficult books I have ever read. By that, I don't mean that in the sense that the writing was difficult to follow or the editing was poor, I mean the story itself and the sadness with which the entire narrative is saturated with makes it an incredibly tough experience. This isn't a happy-go-lucky read and there were times when I almost felt like I couldn't do it anymore. This book affected my mood in such a way that often hours after I put it down I found myself still thinking about it. That being said, it isn't a bad book by any stretch, it is just emotionally draining. You feel Cooper's pain as he struggles to deal with the emotional turmoil he is feeling concerning his mother abandoning him. You also deeply feel Percy's PTSD and live that through the way he deals with situations and people. As the book progresses, these things get even more powerful and definitely affect the reader. That's a tribute to someone who really has command of his writing and William Jensen definitely delivers that emotional pain with every word and scene he puts to the page. At the climax of the book, we discover what it was that compelled Arden to up and leave and it is at once horrifying, mystifying, and an utter shock. Regardless of the toughness of the journey, the ending of this book is worth it and I recommend it to anyone who is looking for something different in their fantasy. This is definitely not the same old same old. Read CITIES OF MEN, you will feel every second and will be left more than satisfied.