Customer Reviews

Solar Flare

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

Having listened to Larry Burkett talk about the pleasures of being debt free, and last month having achieved that goal, I have a soft spot in my heart for him. I teach a class in a state university on "Apocalyptic Fiction," and I thought "Solar Flare" might be a good choice, so I bought it and read it. I was really astonished. The premise is a good one, and it's an exciting book. I had a hard time putting it down. The chances of a solar flare that destroys civilization are about as likely as the chances of an asteroid doing the same, but it could happen, and it's fascinating to speculate about the results. What astonished me, though, was the terrible editor. Some editors edit, but these days many just arrange publication. Burkett got one of the latter sort this time. The problem is not spelling and punctuation, but deeper. Burkett should have caught these mistakes, so we should blame him, too, but barring that his editor should have caught them. Examples? In chapter one, the hero, Jason Hobart, is an assistant professor. Then in chapter two he is an associate professor, then back to assistant, then back to associate. There are paragraphs of dialogue or explanation used almost verbatim in two or more chapters, as if Burkett wrote the chapters a week or two apart and never went back to tie things together and forgot what he had already written. A gang from Indianapolis decides to raid a refugee camp in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, about 500 miles away, and makes the trip in twelve hours--by horse and buggy. A truck caravan is planned to take Prof. Hobart and staff from Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland to New Holland, Pennsylvania, in Amish country, two hours away, traveling by freeway because it's safer. They plan to take I-95 to I-83 to I-78. Fortunately instead they turn onto highway 30 to Lancaster, because you can't get there from here. And it takes them eight hours, much to long. Most of the people in the cities are exacuated to the country, supposedly, and placed in relocation camps of about 25,000 people. But there are only three camps within a 500 mile radius of Washington, even though this includes massive areas of great farm land in Virginia, North Carolina, Maryland, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, etc. Burkett says that the little towns of Pennsylvania are mostly deserted. This seems unlikely, as they would provide plenty of shelter and tools and food (ever heard of grain elevators and corn cribs and feed stores?) and most houses are usually within a couple blocks of good garden plots. Is this a Christian novel? It's not about the return of Christ, and Christianity isn't mentioned until about 3/4th of the way through. When it is, suddenly most of the refugee camp "accepts Christ as their personal savior," then everything is fine. As someone with an undergraduate degree in Journalism, I realize that a lot of news people will lie and cheat and manipulate in any way necessary for a story, and many are terribly biased and have their own agenda. However, the picture of the news media portrayed by Burkett is unrealistically dark. Even if they didn't like the president, surely if there were the chance of a massive solar flare destroying all electrical motors and downing all planes in the air, all the news media would cover this in detail, rather than insisting that it won't happen, simply because they crave bad news, and this is terrible news. Look at what they've done with Y2K! So, read this novel only if you can put up with this sort of problem. If you like world catastrophe novels, this is nowhere near as well-written as Stephen King's "The Stand," but it's pretty cool.

It is so nice to read a novel full of excitement and global crisis without bad language, unnecessarily graphic violence, and gratuitous sex. This is the third novel by Christian author Larry Burkett. It was not as good as his first two, The Illuminati and The Thor Consiracy (basically a two book set), but very well worth the read. Mr. Burkett sets up the situations to allow either the best or the worst to surface in his characters. His subject matter is well researched and believable. Even the worst character, although well described, is not given to filthy language. I don't need to read or hear that language to know that is how the character would talk. Mr. Burkett writes his heroes to always take the high moral ground -- which is as it should be -- and leaves the low ground to the bad guys. Ordinary people are portrayed as thoughtful individuals who, given the choice, will choose the high road. The author betrays his love of God's people with his gentle depic! tion of our struggles to do "the right thing" and the difficulty in knowing which leader to follow when the choices are not always clear. Solar Flare leaves you feeling good, uplifted, and hopeful. I'm eagerly looking forward to Mr. Burkett's next novel.

If you take the time to read all of the reviews on this book as I have, you will come away with a certain degree of confusion. You have 8th graders telling you that they are bored (...a rather standard attitude stance of their age group) and college instructors analyzing the book to death. Perhaps I can help you better in your choice. First, something about me. I do not have TV. I made a personal choice to get rid of it years ago, and because of that I have already gone through the withdrawal of needing to have immediate minute-by-minute sense gratification. So, if you are a TV-holic, probably like the bored 8th graders, do not buy this book. You will require an imagination and clear inner eye which, if you are a TV-holic, will be greatly dimmed. If you are a person who has problems with conservative Christian principals, do not read this book. Those of us who do have conservative Christian principals will not dislike you because you do not share the same principals, though many of us would greatly appreciate you reducing your whining. Larry Burkett is quite a well-known Christian author, and so I am confused by some people who would buy a book by a known Christian author and then complain about the Christian principals within it. If you don't like Christian oriented books, just don't buy them. I read all kinds of books by both well-known and lesser-known authors. When I pick a book to read, I do not spend my time comparing one author to another or one book to another. Why would I compare Tony Hillerman to John Grisham or Larry Burkett to Frank Peretti. I have read all of these authors many times over, but I have never wasted my time comparing one to the other. I simply read the book. So, if you are a bored 8th grader...don't read this book. If you are someone who wants to analyze a book to death...don't read this book. However, if you want to read a book that requires YOU to become involved instead of just being brain-slammed as those who are TV-holics, then you will find this book to be a fun book to read. And for those of you out there who just MUST compare authors, this book will not take you away to the dessert's of Tony Hillerman's Navajo people, it will not tell you how to "skip Christmas" as Mr. Grisham's novels would, and it will not scare you senseless like Frank's writings will....however, it will make you think about what actually CAN happen in the event of a major solar flare (which, by the way, is fully understood by former NASA employee, Larry Burkett) and how people would survive it by pulling together and maintaining standards of personal conduct.

Rarely do I find a book so horrible that I can't finish it. Solar Flare was one of them. I bought the book expecting it to be another brilliant piece of work, like The Illuminati. Besides, the premise looked interesting. Instead, the extremely slow pace and horrible writing soon bored and disgusted me. In fact, the writing style was so different from that of Burkett's earlier novels that I began to wonder if he had really written the book. (I believe it is a strong possibility that a ghost writer penned this novel.)

A few other reviewers have said that this is a "well-written" story. My question to them is this: since when has an overabundant use of the passive voice been considered good writing? My grammar books tell me that passive verb forms produce awkward or stilted sentences. I have never read a book that uses the word "was" as many times as this one does. Also, Burkett--or whoever wrote this--could have shortened the beginning quite a bit without losing any of the story. If you are thinking about reading or buying this book, DON'T. The only way you could enjoy it is if a solar flare wiped out all your brain cells.

I started reading this book and was hooked. Couldn't put it down. The author, i think, was an economist and a Christian, so it definitely has a very interesting view of a not too-impossible, sci-fi-ish world event. Thought it was well-written and exciting!

The only reason this book gets two stars is because of the premise of the story. The characters were rediculous. I am a conservative, but I don't enjoy reading about totally virtuous conservatives and totally depraved liberals. The author, whoever that may be, SCREAMED points that should have been whispered. Not only should the author find another line of work, but the editor should do the same. There were many obvious errors and repetitions. I don't read a lot of novels and was very displeased to have picked such a bad one.

Being familiar with Burkett's non-fiction work, I looked forward to reading this novel. It turned out to be a big dissappointment. The book is filled with characters that are undeveloped and one-dimensional. There are also many inconsistencies and errors. I am afraid I could not recommend this book.

I was anxious to read thie book since I loved The Illuminati, but were the two books even written by the same author? It was not the exciting story I had hoped for. The same cliches were repeated about every 3 pages. The book had almost no Christian emphasis. There were needless accounts of murders, one right after the other. I wanted to say, "Okay, we got the point 150 pages ago. Now get on to something interesting." Too little plot + too many pages = disaster.

It's quite possible that this is worst book I have ever read. The premise is a very good one-a solar flare causing a return to 19th century technology in the US. However, Burkett writes in such a sloppy style that the topic begs for another writer to craft a decent story. Burkett's transitions are abrupt (and, at times, nonexistent), characters are undeveloped and occasionally given to nearly schizophrenic "out-of-characterness," and his dubious preaching shoves honest storytelling out of the way. The characters often seemed to be merely fictional mouthpieces for Burkett's own opinions. I was so disgusted with this book that I couldn't finish it (extremely rare for me). I realize "Solar Flare" is intended as "Christian" fiction (using Burkett's extremely narrow definition of Christianity), but the result is poor fiction.

I get pretty bored sometimes at school, but I've had more excitement staring at my feet than I did reading parts of this book. Some of us were required to read it during a unit on the solar system,but we should have stuck to the textbook. I found it poorly written, and my English education so far only extends to the eighth grade!I thought the author repeated a lot of conversations almost word-for-word, but in other places contradicted himself. The plot was far-fetched and didn't move at all smoothly. Also, it focused too much on the author's political views. Where did he get this deep resentment of liberals and the media?The opinions were entirely too one-sided and the religious ones shallow and sketchy. And how many gang stories can you tell before it starts getting monotonous? Some of the characters seemed to be introduced just so they could be killed off. I didn't like the book's plot or its style, and couldn't really reccomend it. I have read worse books, but not voluntarily.