Customer Reviews

Pandemonium in 2012

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Power: so many want it, but so few want to do good with it. "Pandemonium in 2012" is a political thriller looking into the near future, a Washington controlled by the power hungry. The highest executive branches are in turmoil when both the vice president and president are found dead. Someone steps up to turn the country around, and that someone is Stuart Ramsey. Everyone should be happy, right? Not necessarily, as the plot only thickens in this riveting tale. "Pandemonium in 2012" is highly recommended for community library thriller collections.

This book does a great disservice to the conservative movement. What starts out as a great moment of albiet unrealistic happenstance, ends in condoning violence as a means to oppose the government with bombings. Quite disappointing & unproductive.

Conspiracy theories and books about conspiracy theories abound. Some are absurd and implausible. On the other hand, those that stick with you are the ones that make you wonder if they could happen. Pandemonium in 2012 by Lee Cross brings us into a near-future where the latter type of conspiracy could actually happen.

Because most of the characters in the book are based on people from Charles Schumer to Ann Coulter, the book moves swiftly, leaving more time to enjoy the story instead of figuring out who is who. Another benefit to this approach is that the reader can predict or make a reasonable stab at how each character would react to the situations presented in the book.

One the unfamiliar characters is that of Stuart Ramsey, one of the book's everymen through which the reader can empathize. Cross brings us a full view of the man and his vision for America in a short time. Not unlike John Galt from Atlas Shrugged, Ramsey is the man we wish we could all be, and Cross makes sure he leaves room for the reader to believe we could be like him.

With any work of speculative fiction, the author has to come up with a balance between the real and the imaginary. Cross not only finds that balance, but uses it to its utmost. There's enough realism in the fiction to keep the reader engaged, while leaving room for the story to develop and blossom.

Although it doesn't break up the story into parts, Pandemonium in 2012 reads like a three act play. The first few chapters set the stage for what will come in the rest of the book and does so in a way that is entertaining. The second third of the book addresses the aftermath of the events in the first third, recreates the rising tension from the first third, and pushes the story to a final conflict. The last third of the book ties up the loose ends in a way that can only be described as thrilling.

Another point to bring up about the structure is how cleverly Cross uses the introduction. An introduction to a book is meant to draw in the reader with a snippet of action or a hint at what will happen. Cross, on the other hand, gives us a glimpse into the future after the events of the book have unfolded. Whenever a writer does this, it has to be done so that the story isn't completely given away while at the same time hooking the reader. Cross does a masterful job in doing exactly this. Even though we have an idea of how things will end, the introduction makes it possible for us to still enjoy the ride.

There were a couple of elements that detracted from the enjoyment of the book somewhat. First, the narrative was confusing at times, switching back and forth from a scene with one person or group and the narrator of the story introduced in the introduction. The other way the book could have been stronger overall would have been more character development with some of the other characters that appear later on in the book, including of the narrator. This may give the reader a chance to imagine each of these characters to fill in any gaps, but I would have preferred to have had Cross fill in those gaps for us.

Overall, Pandemonium in 2012 by Lee Cross provides the reader with an exceptional and gripping story that makes us believe that one man can make a difference by taking a stand. Even if what happens in the book doesn't come to pass (and there's more than enough reasons to hope it doesn't), Cross has made his vision for the future of this country enjoyable and inspiring.

This book is a polemic, a political roman-a-clef with the key not terribly well hidden. Anyone who has paid the slightest bit of attention to blogs, the internet and the alternative media will be able to identify all of the slightly-disguised real political personalities, and recognize every one of the issues and situations referenced in a briskly paced 320 pages - everything from the undue influence of the higher courts, illegal immigration, Islamic-inspired terrorism and it's connections to the South American narco-trafficking variety, the biases of main-stream journalism and manufactured controversy.

The characters are many, most of them just quick sketches, due to the complications of an intricate plot, a crescendo of events within a relatively short book. Many of those events might strike the reader as not quite believable, but in the last few weeks and months, we have seen more than a few of these fictional elements come uncomfortably real. A formerly obscure, but well-liked and well-respected local politician vaults to national prominence and is promptly swamped in a tsunami of seemingly coordinated media abuse generated in a matter of days. A nation-wide organization, ACORN is under investigations for filing thousands of fraudulent voter registrations in fifteen states and counting.

Thus, the value of "Pandemonium in 2012" may not lie so much with the writing, which is spare and workmanlike with occasional disconcerting leaps from third to first person - - but as an brief outline of those matters and issues which have been bubbling up underneath the surface of things over the last few years. Most usually those concerns and issues are grandly dismissed as the province of those banished to the political hinterland, unworthy of notice or concern by the higher minds who presume to control the debate of the great social and political issues in this country. Increasingly, however, such concerns cannot and ought not to be dismissed so lightly. Things start on the fringe, become the obsession of a few, and eventually percolate into the mainstream, when a tipping point has been reached. "Pandemonium in 2012" might be a good starting point for seriously considering some of the other horrors which might - in the minds of a good many - imperil the grand American experiment in democracy.

WOW.
What an easy to read....super fast reading. Could not put the book down until finished. No big words to look up, large print and so modern. I am buying many for Christmas gifts.