Structurally, this is an historical novel, set in the worst years of US history. There were really two civil wars in the 1860’s - the War Between the States and the US-Dakota War of 1862. Watchfires Against The Lord engages both, along with the ethical and religious concerns of the dominant culture’s treatment of oppressed minority communities. The current struggle for our nation’s soul has deep roots in our history and theology, and this novel is meant to give a voice to some of the historical issues that still shape us today.

Spiritually, however, Watchfires Against The Lord is a midrash on the biblical book of Habakkuk, the prophet who "dared to question God." Habakkuk bitterly challenges the justice of God, not only on charges of the widespread injustice and violence prevalent in his time, but also through accusations of indifference on the part of the deity. If God is really just, shouldn’t the world reflect it? If his favor is toward the righteous, shouldn’t they prosper? If he is really loving, shouldn’t he find better ways to show it? These are some of humanity’s oldest questions, and they’re still just as relevant today as they were almost 3 millennia ago when Habakkuk cried them.

By encountering the book of Habakkuk in novel form and setting it in a period of history familiar to us, the reader of Watchfires is forced to engage these questions of theodicy and come to a new understanding of God’s work in the world. But be warned: like Habakkuk, Watchfires does not lead the reader by the hand to a predetermined conclusion, or offer shallow-yet-uplifting answers to these ancient questions. The protagonist of the story and the reader both are called upon to struggle for themselves in a brutal world, and leave the battlefield with a new and terrifying understanding of the God they thought they had known.