Action-adventure for a Christian evangelical audience.
With the fourth in The End series, LaHaye and Parshall (Brink of Chaos, 2012, etc.) continue to translate apocalyptic theology into action-adventure fiction.
The rapture has occurred. Christian believers have been taken to heaven. Now, Satan seeks to subdue the world, and his evil agent is the Global Alliance. The good folk left behind, now Christians, are resisting. That’s the theology piece, but the book reads like a spy novel set in the immediate future and using Revelations as a plot outline. Chapters are short, and settings jump around the globe as the narrative follows multiple characters. The protagonist is the head of the Remnant, Ethan March, subject to visions and recipient of miracles. The antagonist is Alexander Colliquin, head of the Alliance. Characters, however, are one-dimensional, although there’s a chaste love story between March and Rivka Reuban, former Mossad agent. There are odd dialogue juxtapositions—a believer is confronted by a murderous pimp in a Hong Kong back alley and threatened with death, only to respond "I’ve settled up my life with Christ. I know where I’m going. Do you?" The issues at hand are, first, the refusal of believers to submit to "BID-Tag" implants, laser-readable identity chips, and second, the Alliance’s effort to subvert the Internet to its own purposes—mind control—by taking over the United States’ vast security mainframe infrastructure, particularly a facility in Utah. Evil machinations in Washington thread through the story, including an assassination, but action zigzags around the world. With the action moving quickly, the narrative is constructed to suggest the apocalypse is near, and so there are references to current events. The writing is prosaic, and the theology is fundamentalist rather than mystical. As a character notes at book's end, the prophesied Tribulation is yet unfinished, and so LaHaye and Parshall have more to write.
Action-adventure for a Christian evangelical audience.Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-310-33464-4
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Zondervan
Review Posted Online: Dec. 20, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2014
These letters from some important executive Down Below, to one of the junior devils here on earth, whose job is to corrupt mortals, are witty and written in a breezy style seldom found in religious literature. The author quotes Luther, who said: "The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn." This the author does most successfully, for by presenting some of our modern and not-so-modern beliefs as emanating from the devil's headquarters, he succeeds in making his reader feel like an ass for ever having believed in such ideas. This kind of presentation gives the author a tremendous advantage over the reader, however, for the more timid reader may feel a sense of guilt after putting down this book. It is a clever book, and for the clever reader, rather than the too-earnest soul.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1942
ISBN: 0060652934
Page Count: 53
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1943
Hoffman (The Red Garden, 2011, etc.) births literature from tragedy: the destruction of Jerusalem's Temple, the siege of Masada and the loss of Zion.
This is a feminist tale, a story of strong, intelligent women wedded to destiny by love and sacrifice. Told in four parts, the first comes from Yael, daughter of Yosef bar Elhanan, a Sicarii Zealot assassin, rejected by her father because of her mother's death in childbirth. It is 70 CE, and the Temple is destroyed. Yael, her father, and another Sicarii assassin, Jachim ben Simon, and his family flee Jerusalem. Hoffman's research renders the ancient world real as the group treks into Judea's desert, where they encounter Essenes, search for sustenance and burn under the sun. There too Jachim and Yael begin a tragic love affair. At Masada, Yael is sent to work in the dovecote, gathering eggs and fertilizer. She meets Shirah, her daughters, and Revka, who narrates part two. Revka's husband was killed when Romans sacked their village. Later, her daughter was murdered. At Masada, caring for grandsons turned mute by tragedy, Revka worries over her scholarly son-in-law, Yoav, now consumed by vengeance. Aziza, daughter of Shirah, carries the story onward. Born out of wedlock, Aziza grew up in Moab, among the people of the blue tunic. Her passion and curse is that she was raised as a warrior by her foster father. In part four, Shirah tells of her Alexandrian youth, the cherished daughter of a consort of the high priests. Shirah is a keshaphim, a woman of amulets, spells and medicine, and a woman connected to Shechinah, the feminine aspect of God. The women are irretrievably bound to Eleazar ben Ya'ir, Masada's charismatic leader; Amram, Yael's brother; and Yoav, Aziza's companion and protector in battle. The plot is intriguingly complex, with only a single element unresolved. An enthralling tale rendered with consummate literary skill.
Pub Date: Oct. 4, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-4516-1747-4
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2011
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