Customer Reviews

The End of the Age

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

First off, I'm not a fan of the writing style. It covers so much information and time with little dialogue, or characters for that matter. But that's just the style. The way the story was presented was what I had a problem with.

It seemed like the author had a lot of interesting ideas on what he thought the end times would be like, and he didn't want to write an end-times non-fiction spiritual book, so he just presented it as fiction, but didn't quite know how to do that.

Characters are introduced simply to experience the asteroid plumetting into the earth. Then, they drop off. All of a sudden, near the end, they come back, and now they're like generals or something, or leading some kind of airstrike during the battle of Armaggedon. WHAT?!

This book is a grid, a blueprint for a certain way it COULD happen. It is not a story about people, or a story with a plot. It is just a list of events that read on until Jesus comes.

The only reason I gave it two stars was because it didn't follow the whole rapture-theory at all(that word isn't in the Bible, and even implications of one doesn't say WHEN during the tribulation it would be). In this story, the Christians are here for the whole thing, and everything isn't quite so set and orlderly and expected like the Left Behind series. It follows the premise that throughout the last century or so, we've already experienced the Seal Judgements, and that the asteroid hitting earth is the beginning of a great cataclysm that mankind is about to face.

IF you want a different take and aren't expecting much of anything else, read this, but not if you want a real story with passion or voice.

I had to read this book for a class in the book of Revelation. I could bearly force myself to get through the book it was so bad. The characters were flat, the story line terribly predictable, the dialogue was boring, and it couldn't have been written at more than a third grade reading level. I noticed all this and I'm an engineering student not an english major!

I would have hoped that a book written by a man with the religious stature of Pat robertson would have yielded more spiritual insight. While I wasn't necessarily expecting something of the same quality of Brian Caldwell's masterpiece We All Fall Down or the likes of C.S. Lewis, I was somewhat disappointed in the simplicity Robertson brings to bear on religion. Essentially, this is a good book to read if you're looking to simply re-familiarize yourself with your faith. anything deeper and you will have to look elsewhere I'm afraid.

I did not even finish this book, got to about 2/3 of it and just breezed through the ending. Only read it because my bestfriend recommended it. Badly written, dry and slow, in no way can Pat's style compare to my favorite Christian fiction writer, Frank Peretti (although the Oath was a bit disappointing).

And Pat's still here. So much for the Rapture Pat.

I'm not a Christian but I thought the story seemed interesting and I found a copy cheap so I decided to give this book a try. At first glance, "End of the Age" is a high concept novel. A meteor hits Earth. Large parts of America and Asia are destroyed. It's an interesting scenario and in some ways, the book is well researched as far as what some of the consequences would be if that happened.

In the hands of a good fiction writer, this concept could have been made into a great novel, but it's obvious that Robertson doesn't just want to tell a story. He can't avoid preaching and voicing his personal political and religious opinions. If you're a fan of Robertson, you won't mind, but if you're not, you will find it too preachy. [...]

The book is not without merits. It has some good points and the feeling of global disaster, affecting the whole planet with no place to escape, is created in a surprisingly effective way. Although, at times I get the feeling that Robertson really enjoys wallowing in the disaster he imagines will come. There book also lacks any multidimensional characters and a protagonist. As a result, the book soon starts to feel like a long list of earthquakes, floods and volcanic eruptions. Especially in the last third of the book the pace slows down too much. There's also too much that distracts from the narrative to make it a good novel. Except for the blatant preaching and hatred of non-Christians, a large portion of the book is taken up by long scenes of bible study. If you want to learn about Christian end times beliefs, I'm sure there are lots of non-fiction books about it out there, although Robertson does not share the pre-tribulational views of Tim LaHaye and Hal Lindsey. In this novel, the Christians are not "raptured" before the tribulation.

As a novel, "The End of the Age" is honestly somewhat better than I expected from Robertson. It is superior to the neverending, tedious, "Left Behind" novels, but it still has many flaws. There are better ways to spend the hours it takes reading it. I am sure many Robertson fans will like it better.

This book was very simple. There really wasn't reference to the Bible in many areas where there should have been. I would find myself really enjoying parts of the book. Then there would be the letdown because of the simple nature that it was written in.

I read this book on a dare over Christmas break 1998 after being offered it by a friend, and fellow skeptic, at Colorado State University, who was a physics major.

It combines dull, unexpressive prose, plus a boring, predictable tale of end-of-history redemption for American evanagelical Christians. I guess this is a way for the fundamentalist Christians to tell themselves they have been right all along, liberals and Jews be damned. Robertson's writing borders on self-parody and I found myself amused by its poor quality. He's not a good writer and obviously made no effort to hide it behind the writing talents of a good editor. Quite frankly, I doubt a good editor could do much with this dreck beyond tossing it in the trash can. Robertson is a charasmatic leader of the evangelic Christian movement, but we find no evidence of it in his writing.

What was most disapointing of all about this book was Robertson's anti-Hindu bigotry. His chiding of Jews for their non-belief is subtle, but his open hostility to Hinduism should be seen as nothing more than blatant racism.

I like this book because it makes sense of the revelation and what it is going to be like. He took his vision of the revelations and made it come to life in this book. It's an awesome read.

I bought this second hand, expecting an entertaining read and found a weak attempt at writing a novel. The characters have no foundation and if you picture them actually behaving the way they do in the pages, you'll find it laughable. Picturing anyone actually speaking the dialogue in the book will make you giggle to yourself.
Secondly, the science is just awful... the meteor burning so hot in space days before it reaches Earth - what is it burning out there in the vacuum of space? How is it causing a heat wave on Earth?? If it's shining so bright, why was it only discovered a week before it hits??? Why does the main character keep switching back and forth from being an astronomy expert to knowing absolutely nothing about astronomy?
In a way, I'm enjoying reading it in the same way I enjoy watching the occasional bad movie - to poke fun at it, and actually picture it like a movie... one of those bargain bin disaster movies you find at gas stations.

We should all be thankful the author lost the 1988 Presidential Primaries...