INSTRUMENTS OF DARKNESS

The crazed being from the future who possessed Eddie Rodriguez and then took over the government's huge central computer in Mortal Instruments (1977) has now entered Rumanian peasant Ianos Iorga and made him a guru with an enthusiastic world following. And the same agents who fought ""Rodriguez"" are again trying to prevent a world takeover by this power, who is ultimately revealed here as Caligula/Attila/Hitler/Lucifer. An interfaith team of exorcists recruited by telepathic psychiatrist Myra Sokolov only makes ""Iorga"" laugh--but there's another Hispanic superkid on the scene, and in a final Yankee Stadium confrontation 16-year-old Luis Ortiz turns out to be inhabited by Apollo/Ra/Christ/Buddha/Allah--for whom Iorga's evil possessor is no match. Both the style and the cosmic connections in Bethancourt's collage of clipped memos, thoughts, and conversations come closer to parody here than in Mortal Instruments; but kids will probably read this just for the slickness, pace, and tough veneer.