the end of the world as we know it.

[katster]

I just finished the last book of the Left Behind series.

The verdict? Sadly disappointing. There's *so* much that can be done around the theme of "trouble in paradise", and... well, Jerry Jenkins is not the guy to do it. It was okay, but it mostly only covers the first hundred years of the Millennium, and meh.

Just disappointing.

Also, any book that has the following quote in the introduction:

It should be plain from our treatment of this great future period that we are the opposites of anti-Semites. Indeed, we hold that the entire Bible contains God's love letter to and plan for His chosen people. If Israel had no place within the future Kingdom of God, we could no longer trust the Bible.

What you might not know by reading simply this extracted quote is that the only way a Jew was getting into the Millennial Kingdom was to confess that Jesus is Lord. That doesn't quite strike me as the opposite of anti-Semites.

Also, my favorite moment in the book -- you shall know the bad guys by their clothes:

But as he looked closely at the pinstripes, he noticed they were made up of a nearly microscopic pattern. Tiny letters. Row after row of LTO, LTO, LTO. The letters ran together, forming the distinctive pattern LTOLTOLTOLTOLTOLTOLTOLTO that from even two feet away just looked like normal striping.

The three were trading contact information when it struck Kenny that maybe it wasn't LTO at all. Maybe it was TOL.

Yes. The bad guys will make themselves obvious by their pinstripes. ;) (TOL is the acronym for The Other Light, the group of folks who have decided to worship Satan instead of God. Why they would do this isn't exactly made clear in the book -- well, other than the prophecy says it has to happen that way. We can't argue with prophecy, can we?)

Anyway, the story was boring, the conflict lacking, and Jenkins is so afraid of blasphemy, he makes his God into a robot that can only quote the Bible. :P And that's all she said.

Meh.

Comments

[netdancer.livejournal.com]

This series was so disappointing. I love the Heaven vs Hell conflict theme; this guy just butchered it and he wasn't even a passable writer on top of it.

[shadur.livejournal.com]

I'll never cease to be amazed at people who read the premise of the LB series and then somehow assume that the books aren't going to suck horribly...

I mean, come on: It's essentially wish fulfillment bible fanfiction written by religious nutcases. Not even Heinlein would be able to prevent that combination from sucking.

[tanesmuti.livejournal.com]

Not to mention ties to the Dominionist gaggle... who're, by far, scarier than anything I can imagine.

[netdancer.livejournal.com]

Yes it is, but man, that could have been written better by ME and I'm a witch. I wanted something like "Prophecy" and I got "The Possession of Emily Rose".

It almost makes me want to do the damn series myself, and see if it sells the same way. That actually isn't that bad an idea; wonder if I could get the Catholic church onboard to vet my data, being as I'm a sinful pagan. :)