Customer Reviews

CAIN

5 star:		(39)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

Satan inhabits the body of a rejuvenated super-soldier experiment gone awry. Sound familiar? Sure it does...but darn...it was pretty fun to read. Huggins can sure create a great unkillable monster. (Read Hunter as well) These books should be made into movies for "guys who like movies." This one has it all: blood, gore, love, hate, guns, and a cute little girl. What more could you ask for?

Cain, one of several creature-feature-action-adventure novels by Huggins (also Leviathan, Hunter), is great if you love action films. I certainly enjoyed it. Plenty of action, nasty monster, superhuman good guy, all the standard clichés.
The problem, however, is the abundance of said clichés. With the exception of an interesting Jesuit priest, the story and characters are all run-of-the-mill stereotypes. All the action scenes are standard set pieces. The Biblical allusions are heavy-handed (the demonic Cain's previous incarnation was defeated by King David, Cain fights a character named Solomon, i.e. David's son). Character resolution is tied too neatly (Solomon loses his wife and daughter, then rescues a single mom and her daughter). Huggins overuses the same adjectives over and over again, like "volcanic" and "titanic." And apparently there are some inaccuracies in his use of biology and military facts, but see other reviews for more details. Still, entertaining, but check out "Leviathan" for a better monster and "Hunter" for a better book overall.

This book is a fast read and would be a great script for B Sci Fi movie. I picked up this book because of the alluded religious/Sci Fi thriller. This is an action book, and not a mystery thriller. Basically you have evil being that possesses the scientifically enhanced body of a dead former CIA operative who was at his peak form at death, set free upon the world. And the hero, who is set upon stopping him with the help of the Catholic Church.

Some of the book is written well. The action is non-stop. And the storyline is very easy to follow. The book has a good basis. The bad thing is that the author has not seemed to do his research. Not on the medical advancements he tries to use for the enhancement of the body. Nor in the geographic locations he inaccurately describes. But it is a fun read non-the less. Pick it up if you have a 2-hour flight. It will pass the time quickly.

Cain = an indestructable techno-vampire Solomon=a carbon-copy character that could fit into any formulaic 80's action film. Speaking of formulaic, that's the best way to describe the plot. Good idea for a book, and the character of Cain was cool, but the rest of this book is garbage.

It is about Cain a super soldier possesed by Satan. If that wasn't bad enough he has been built to be impervious to all modern weapons and must drink human blood to stay alive. Soloman is an ex-soldier who is persuaded to come back to kill Cain. Marcelle, an Exorcist, helps Sol in his battle against Cain. It reads like an action film, right down to bonding between Sol and the scientist who created Cain's daughter. But don't let this put you off, it is an extremly good book which also contains some very interesting detail about exorcisim. READ THIS BOOK!! (I would have given it 10 stars but they would'nt let me.)

Reading this book is like gulping down a Big Mac and fries--it hits the spot, but it's not that good for you. I was really torn in reviewing this. Plot-wise and concept-wise it's simplistic but very effective. On the other hand, the prose is so amatuerish it's laughable. Huggins claims to have been a journalist but I'd have hated to be his editor! In fact, he also claims to have been a cop and in the military, but (as other reviewers pointed out) many of his details are equally bad. (A MYLAR vest?!?!?) Worst of all, his historical and philosophical grounding is as skewed as you'd expect from a "Christian" writer--just the sort of semi-truth they spew around about archeology or Hebrew language at the typical Bible college. (First of all, there were Stone, Copper, Bronze and Iron Ages--but no such thing as the "Silver Age," during Davidic times or any other. Second, there's absolutely no reason a Judeo-Christian demon would rant in "Silver Age" LATIN either, as opposed to, say, Hebrew.) I did enjoy this book at times, but I probably would have been easier on it if I hadn't just read EYES by Robert Subiaga, Jr. (Also sold on Amazon.com) Let me tell you, THAT'A a book that has it together in everything from philosophy and metaphysics to martial arts and weaponry. Go ahead and order CAIN if you must but then you owe it to yourself to read something like EYES and compare them.

Here comes the formula...the old warrior punishing himself because he lost his wife and little daughter, the self-questioning Jesuit priest, the good looking scientist babe and her little daughter. See where this is going yet? Cain, supercharged and dyno-tuned, is the six million dollar man with a silly religious twist. Cain can rip through steel, run like a cheetah and throw dice with the best of them. Of course the protagonist (name of Solomon no less) is much tougher. He fights with Cain with regularity and never really gets hurt. The Jesuit priest must have seen "The Exorcist" one time too many as he wields his silver crucifix and slips into the thees and thous of King James English. I won't even go into the Mother Superior nervously fingering her rosary beads. If you wasted time with this tripe; perhaps you wondered (as I did),why the government just didn't call in a sniper with a tranquilizer gun..... I know this book put me to sleep!

To sum it up, Cain is a very good book, but it is a hollywood book-nothing bad about that mind you. It is filled with action, alittle gore, alittle pain, alittle love, and of course Sidekicks Galor!But all in all, the book delivers with a relatively understandable storyline and great characters-also tippy hollywood types, but hey, aside from that, it is a terrific Book.

Most everyone else here basically out lined the story so there is no point in repeating myself here! I just wanted to comment because this book was excellent, and I think everyone who likes reading novels should read this book! It was incredible! It had amazing action and the characters in there all seemed so real. It was very, very good! Definitely the best book I had read so far! I am reading though another book called the Hunter again written by Huggins and it does have the makings of being better than Cain! I don't know I might like that better when I finish it, but I would definitely recommend reading all of his books!

What a laughable effort, though presumably quite lucrative for the author and the publisher. The writing is so bad, as to become masochistically enjoyable. Pompous adjectives drip from the pages, it's hard to stop yourself from laughing out loud. How's this for a literary effort: ".. blood-drenched gargoyle emerging from a bone-littered tomb, raising black-taloned hands .." ? Uff. Expected Simon & Schuster to employ editors of some taste and knowledge. Probably the most pitiful bit is the remark in "Acknowledgments" of using "well over a hundred reference materials" - well, nothing can really replace literary talent and true erudition, can it ? Minus 10 stars for greed and lack of talent.