The Preacher Man

Get this published!

This was a grand, epic story of huge proportions, which reminded me of Issac Asimov's work.

I don't know what it's doing on this website for free - I would have paid for an ebook version.

Who is the author? SURELY s/he is a published author? Playing games with us?!!

An amazing story

I cannot believe this story hasn't been picked up by a film studio or at least published. The author has produced a real gem. The rating the readers have given it serve to demonstrate it's true value.

Thank you

Great Story

I agree with the others, you should send this to a publisher!
I was sucked right in. Great detail, I loved the intricacies of the society you created. Great ending too ... Endings are always tricky.

Very good

You are obviously very skilled. As a reader I found some aspects kinda lame but overall you could say it's a masterpiece. Great detail, awesome imagination and creativity, plus a healthy dose of scholarly input. You should write more. You ability to create a futuristic world is amazing. You should try fantastic otherworlds too.

BORING

A pure exgeration of math data!!!

Wonderful

What can I say but wow. This story had me hooked, as I was led by the love the main charatures had for each other and the way they meet each adversity with a strength of conviction. The story was excellently costructed to leave you wanting each new chapter. I loved the melding of the science in the story as it helped the whole of the characture and plot development.
I am now looking forward to reading the sequal - the preacher man's daughter.
Great work.

hooked

i was very hooked on your story, so much that i was late for work ha ha thanks for writing it

Really loved this story. Read it with fascination and joy - in fact I skipped most of the sex because I enjoyed it purely for the story. Haha. The only thing I would change? I wish Ilias had a flaw. That would turn this into a story worthy of the title of literature.

Wonderful story

I love bouncing around the scifi and non-erotic sections of literotica looking for interesting ideas and new stories. This was a fantastic novel that made my eyes water and heat hammer at times. All in all it took me almost two weeks of reading in my spare time and while on vacation with my wife's family. Wonderful story and I look forward to reading the preachers daughter next.

The sign of a good story is…

…when you come back to it again and again just to re-read it in its entirety. Few novels in my collection of over 3,000 hardcovers fit this bill. Even fewer short stories. In over a decade I have found only three on Literotica. And this story is one of them. Moreover, this author manages to snag this distinction twice, not only for this story but also a second time for another one of his/her short stories called “Backscatter”. I, for one, would strongly recommend to this author that they look into refining these stories into full-length novels. I would be one of the first to line up for a first-edition hardcover for my shelves.

I am

At löss of words

This story has so much potential, but just never delivers...

After finishing this story I can't help feeling disappointed...

The whole story is just filled with build-ups to nothing... there's just no climax.
(that's for the action and the sex..)

The whole universe where the story takes place is worked out really well, the outline for the story is great and (most) characters are really well developed.

However there is just way to much pointless information and the exciting things that your expecting either never happen or are written in a single sentence....

I hope next time you'll spend as much time on the writing as on the background story.
This story should have been great, but it was just boring...

rating: 3/5

pleasant surprise

When I started reading this story I was perplexed as to why it was rated so highly. There was too much exposition and alot of sify talk. But I quickly became engrossedand invested in Alias and Hus wives. I also found myself skipping the sex scenes in order to get back to the plsiy. What us would count as the only downfall is that we never really got a thorough background on Alias to explain whis thoughts and actions.

Loved it!!! Should be published!

Direct address comma!

I'm at page 14 so far and am loving the story. I'm sure I'll work through the rest of it, but…

I really wish the author had learned how to use the comma necessary for direct address. That is, the comma when someone is being spoken to. About 95% of them are entirely missing. It's not optional, and its omission is like throwing mud on a really nice tapestry. Yes, you can see the beauty of the underlying weaving, but it's marred by unneeded and unsightly blemishes.

Reference: http://thewritingresource.net/2010/02/11/punctuati on-points-the-direct-address-comma/

Almost Perfect Story

If you're reading the comments to figure out if you should invest time in reading this story, I say, do it. The Preacher Man is worth your time because of the rich descriptions, exciting plot, and the vivid addition of verbiage on science and tech behind a futuristic world. (Love the conflation of both art and science in fiction.) The sex scenes were a nice plus, and I really liked that they weren't the essence of the story. Like some commenters I kept wondering why this hasn't been picked up by a major movie studio yet!

One of the two slight flaws is that Ilias is too perfect, his life generally too smooth-sailing, and might seem a little unrealistic. Perhaps he should have stronger struggles with morality/truth and taking the easy way out/power--he would have no problem being absolutely ruthless--since discipline was so ingrained in him from young. I was happy when he became an eternal virgin towards the end for 60+ years as that gave him some disadvantage to work with. If he had encounters with some evil but seductive women along the way, it might add some interesting levels to the plot as well. Still, LOVE IT OVERALL!

Exceptional Plot

This is a great SciFI story with an exceptional plot. I would love to see it published. For those of you who wonder if it is worth spending your time, there is definitely more erotic literature out there--but this is top notch story telling.

Phenomenal

I have been reading stories on this site for years and I am blown away by the depth and intricacy in this story. This could be published as a short novel I look forward to reading more by this author and will be book marking this for future reading :)

5 stars are not enough

I'm truly glad I've finally taken the time to read this story. It's absolutely amazing on so many levels! And to think it's on here for free. I would definitely pay for this story and moreover, i think it should be required reading. It easily rivals some of the best works of literature available. I always thought Brave New World was lacking and now I see how the topic should have been handled via the hands of a true master. What a treat! Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Epic? Really? Yawns - 4 words, fine 5, 6...

Sympathetic Mormon in Sci-Fi version.

3 final words. Cult, Polygamy, Sluts.

Surprisingly good!

I found everything from the crisis point onwards surprisingly emotionally moving. The events after the realization of what happened brought me to tears. I've never had that reaction to a narrative in all the stories I've read in my life! It shocked me to have such an emotional reaction. It's inspiring me to read more stories and books again, something I haven't really done in a decade.

I enjoyed immersing myself in this intricate universe. The final crisis surprised me in a good way. Somehow I'd missed the clues that might happen, and it was not the endgame I expected from the trajectory of the story, most of which leading to that point had been predictable. In retrospect I see the clues laid out earlier. I realize now that uniting in a singular goal was one of the few ways people could quickly come to terms with what they had gone through - the original plan would have taken far longer.

Anyone reading this can tell I'm avoiding giving out spoilers. I highly recommend giving yourself the patience to read it from start to finish. The early chapters feel a bit mechanical, without the emotional depth of the rest of the story, but I kept reading. It becomes much more interesting once the protagonist begins forming connections with important people in his life. It's fascinating to watch the interpersonal dynamics of the main character's inner circle.

This was an excellent novella and could easily be expanded into a full novel-length book. It would be fun to explore the personalities and characters of the supporting cast in more detail.

One challenge with creating complex characters is giving each a unique personality; doubly difficult since any character created for a book is often created by a single person's mind, the author. Some of the characters felt like they had too similar personalities. I felt like the supporting cast were a little too perfect, and needed more character flaws to deepen and diversify their personalities. This would especially be a way to distinguish the two sets of people with different minds. The people developing normally would likely develop more of the strengths and flaws common to adults.

For people who are interested in the sci-fi themes explored here, I highly recommend the TV show Dollhouse, or the movie Memento. Some things in this story reminded me of that show and movie, particularly the subject of how the human mind deals with memory.

2nd time

I have read this twice. The second time was even better. I love reading l and espdcially sci-fi and fantasy novels, but this is one of the best ive read. Thank you for making these hamming.
- Phantom

The scope of this world

the hundreds of hours it must have taken to construct this complex society. The religious code made me wonder what the predominate religions were in the pre-war world. Eternal virginity concept was shocking, like nothing I've ever read. I suspect some current religions would do that if the could- I'm looking at you, Islam.

Yes, Ilias was the perfect in every way type hero that others criticized, but there are many awesome books like Count of Monte Christo or the Odyssey have a similar hero and that's okay. I will say that it was hard to keep the wives straight in my mind. Maybe there were too many characters to develop into individuals so you never get attached to any one of them. All in all, it was an exceptional novel and hard to stop reading. One of the very best.

truely well imagineered

hammingbyrd7, I want to complement you on the depth and humanity of your story "The Preacher Man". You skillfully invented a fascinating )in the classical meaning of fascination) world and a complexity of characters and characterizations.

I look forward to reading your other posted stories. My only regret is that you have not posted anything new in several years. I hope you are doing well and if you are publishing elsewhere, could you please provide us a link?

Disappointing erotica

This novel is long enough to be published as a book. It is set in the future with a complex social system based on an extreme fictional religion that feels a bit like an Islam 2.0. The novel places its focus on this social system as well as politics and such rather than character development and relationships.

However this is presented as an erotica and as an erotica it is very disappointing. After a lengthy introduction to the world, the main character starts to get some wives where it finally starts to get a bit sexually interesting. However, the sex scenes are few and far in between, and the sex is mostly traditional, non-daring and boring. It was not enough that the sex scenes were lacking but half way through it forgets it is an erotica altogether only to remember of this somewhere near the end where the main character wakes up to and fucks a granny! So that's what you have to look forward to after you're reading frantically and getting excited to finally get to read some action.

Absolutley Brilliant Novel

Having read the first part of this epic novel, I transferred all episodes to Word so that I could read it as a novel, picking it up as time permitted. I enjoy Sci-fi which this is but it also explores social structures and relationships thoroughly. The eroticism is not the main purpose of the story and it is all the better for that. I thank hammingbyrd7 for the time and effort he/she has put in to give us an absolutely brilliant novel.

magazine not clip. Seriously

It is a magazine, not a clip.

Reminds me of Heinlein

This was absolutely beautiful. It reminds me of some of Heinlein's books. I'm reading other people's comments, and I agree with their praise. This truly deserves to be published. I disagree with one who commented that though this was labelled erotica, it wasn't very erotic. I think it is, erotic. Not your typical erotica, but well, I'm thinking that in a few years, what people think of as erotica now, will be different from the erotica of the future. I am so glad you wrote this and hope to read more of you work. This is actually the third time I've read this. The first time I read it was in 2nd year college. I'm well beyond my college years already, but I still keep coming back to this. I hope you are well, and do share your stories with us in the future.

Detailed, creative, but extraordinarily islamophobic

This story was phenomenal, despite some critiques that I have. The detail and immersion this book provided is on par with the best fantasy/sci-if/post-apocalyptic stories. I especially love the the amount of attention paid to the positions of the sun, it provided a sense of realism considering the protagonist was consistently traveling to different latitudes. Although the wives lacked complex personalities, they were skillfully used as plot devices to elaborate on the history, facilitate the plot profession, or in the case of the eternal virgin wives as recaps to events that were skipped.

On to the critiques. Whereas it is a monumental task to create a sci-fi universe, the fact that the religion in the story is obviously a thinly-veneered and exaggerated Islam points to a lack of originality on the author's part. The allusions to Islam are abundant: multiple wives, historical Muslim city names, the burqa, the "pillars" of the Code of Bel'dar, etc. Perhaps it is a critique of Islam, which is acceptable, but I believe the critique came from a place of anti-Islamist thinking prevalent in the (Christian) west today, considering the ways in which it was exaggerated. I also don't think the critique was coming from an agnostic or atheist perspective since at the end the protagonist becomes a compassionate messianic savior figure, who sacrifices himself for all, very Jesus-esque. The use of the messianic allegory makes it clear that the author is pro-Jesus and anti-Islam. Also, the author's attempt to envision a gender equal society is ironically contrasted with his use of women as sexual toys or plot devices based on their skills, devoid of developed individual characters.

All in all, a great piece of work if you can ignore the biases of the author.

wow. just wow.

This is the best thing I have read in quite some time! It kept me fully entries the whole time. I initially loved the sexual parts in it, but as I liked the story and plot more and more, I actually started to not like those parts, weird enough as that is since it was published on this website. Whoever wrote this, you have a bright future ahead of you like Ilias, I mean, Abdul Hadi. Good work and I might try and copy this down and take out the sexual parts go more people to read, with permission, of course.

brilliant!

I have read a lot of stories on literotica but I never comment. But I thought that this story was so brilliant that I had to praise the author.
I wish there were more stories of this quality on literotica.

Thank you

This was absolutely amazing, I came looking for an ordinary erotic story but ended up reading for something like 7 hours straight. Thank you!

Best story I've read here

A truly wonderful amazing story, full of so many future ideas. It's been a real joy to read.
This deserves to be published, a fantastic story and a beautiful ending.
Congratulations.

something special!!!

I started reading and just couldn't stop. Thank you. This story is captivating in its originality. Well done :)

Wow, that was very well done

I really enjoyed this story. Its focus stayed very constant throughout the story, which is uncommon in unprofessional writing. I think the whole story does very well from beginning, to middle, to end.

Just stunning and amazing

You sir or madam are a brilliant writer. If you just take out the erotic parts, it could be a full length novel and I can guarantee it will be successful. Just amazing. I want to read through it again and again!

Wonderful

This was an extremely well written and engaging story. Thank you for sharing it. I would definitely recommend it to anyone who enjoys science fiction.

You must publish this story as a full length novel. AMAZING!!

Seriously, it was one of the best structured story I've ever read. Such detailed concepts of science fiction and a completely believable future for earth...
ABSOLUTELY ENJOYED READING IT!!!

Amazing Story

I can't get over how lucky I was to find this!

Well written, great characters and SUCH A GREAT STORY! The themes of slavery, sexism and control really make you reflect on the modern world in many ways.

10/10

Stunning

This is by far the best story I have read on Literotica!

From Gregs down in the Caribnean

Lovely story had me enthralled totally

Amazing

This has been one of the best things I have read in the last few months... You really should consider publishing this as a book.

I'm not sure where to start...

The world building in this is amazing. At first the protagonist's preoccupation with geographic positioning, rising and setting of the sun and time was annoying. Eventually I was pulled into it and the realization of the importance of their prayer cycles. Brilliant. The rest of the story worked the same way, immersion.
The relationships and the sex in this story are beautiful and sweet. I truly loved this. I actually feel enriched for having read it. It would be a shame and a crime to not make this availble to a wider readership.

Amazing

Wow, what an imagination you have! This was a very impressive story. Some of the technical details went over my head and thus were a bit annoying, but if you edit things to sound less technical or descriptive in some places, this could be quite a book! So much genuine emotion, so much creativity, I got totally absorbed in this story and read it in two days! I am officially a fan.

I also completely agree that you should consider publishing this story as a book. The plot was extremely well thought out and written. While the dystopian society idea has been done before, this is a fresh and interesting take on the idea. We'll done, and I hope to read more from you in the future!

wow - what an imagination

I loved this story!

Beautiful

Absolutely lovely, totally captivating work. Amazing that something so great is free. I'd love to have this in a physical book.

AS I was re-reading this terrific story...

...Chapter 10. The Forest Primeval brought to mind several issues that that may be if interest to some readers.

There are journals from early missionaries and explorers , that they saw packs of grizzly bears hunting bison and attacking Indigenous villages when the natives had been stricken with epidemics of European diseases.

As with our ecologically destructive house-cats, most predators lack full, three-color sight. That is why so many predators hunt at dusk and dawn when they have the advantage of better processing of black/grey.white images.

Think of the difference between the same scene being photographed in color and in black & white.The color photo has more complexity and description. The b&w photo has more nuance, clarity and perspective, an advantage for a sight hunter. The color image blurs, due to overlapping of the color pixels along the edges.

I never did hunt bear or other recognized predators, however...

Many decades ago, when I was a kid, I did some hunting along the Arizona-Sonora border/desert. Using old-fashioned bows and arrows scavenged from an abandoned Dude Ranch archery range. One thing I learned was; when I went hunting peccary, they came hunting me back! Pigs like the taste of human as much as we like the taste of pork.

Wow! Beautiful story!

I could not put my phone down. This story is well written, exquisitely detailed and I fell in love with the characters! Thank you for sharing it with us!

Thank you for this fantastic story

Excellent dystopian sci-fi!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!