Others say...

"Just one more book in the all-encompassing, enthralling, and utterly absorbing Left Behind Series"
From the very first letter of the alphabet that my eyes looked upon inside this series of books, until the very last period of the very last sentence, I was hooked. Each one of these books absorbed my attention like no other book has ever done in my life. Biblically sound, theatrically entertaining, and brilliantly written, the Left Behind books will inspire you to dig into God's word and take the pieces of news from your T.V. screen and match them right smack-dab up with the prophecies of the Bible. Your hair will stand up, your heart will race, and you will find yourself helplessly caught in the suspense. Once you finish one of these books, you will desperately race to your computer screen or your local library to pick up the next one!

Carrie Lynn Jones
Author of It All Began... When Jesus Gave Me Sneakers


"Nicolae Who?"
It's interesting that this volume of the Left Behind series--Nicolae: The Rise of Antichrist--actually doesn't have Nicolae Carpathia in it very much. He certainly doesn't do much "rising" here. In fact, he was featured much more in both of the previous novels, and his entire rise to power is found in those books, too. Actually, he's almost non-existent in this book, and talked about more than shown.

I say it's "interesting," but really it's depressing. It's just another proof for my hypothesis that LaHaye and Jenkins don't really care about the story they're writing. Oh, they care about making money, and possibly about converting people to their... interesting take on Christianity... but otherwise? About plot? About character? About suspense? About drama? No. They don't care about that.

But then, if you're here at the third book having read the first two, you already knew that. So, instead of continuing to lament the obvious lack of skill on display here, I figured I'd take up the challenge that the authors had seemed to set for themselves. Let's discuss the character of Nicolae for a moment.

For a villain to be great, we usually need to be able to relate to that villain on some level. They must have some sympathetic quality. So: the Phantom of the Opera felt outcast, and was in love; Javert was a man of order and law, dedicated to doing his duty; even Darth Vader had a man behind the machine. Since Nicolae is the Antichrist, however, he has no goodness in him. The authors strive to make him an incarnation of pure evil. The problem being that this makes Nicolae a fairly uninteresting character. Nicolae will never change, never grow, never surprise us. He'll simply continue twirl his moustache.

Beyond that, even if we construct a fairly unsympathetic villain, they usually are shown to truly believe in their own cause. Satan, in Paradise Lost, was passionate about his refusal to be subserviant. In real life, we may despise Hitler (and rightly), but we cannot doubt his desire to see the country he loved grow prosperous and strong (though his actions ultimately shattered it almost beyond repair). Villains usually do not believe themselves to be villainous. They often see themselves as heroic.

What does Nicolae believe in? Of what cause or campaign does he see himself the hero? We're provided no real insight into his motivation, nor do we know what he truly wants to accomplish.

There are also some questions about Nicolae that won't leave the reader, but upon which the authors don't seem to care to posit an answer. For instance: does Nicolae know that he's the Antichrist? Does he understand his own role in the end times? It's hard to believe that he does know what's going on, because then he'd also know exactly what would happen (for instance, that he'd be unable to kill the Witnesses at the Wailing Wall till a prescribed day; and also, that he's ultimately going to lose)... but, on the other hand, he's obviously aware of his powers of hypnosis, etc., as he consciously uses them. Where does Nicolae believe these powers of his come from?

I'm not saying that Nicolae has to be, at heart, a "good guy." But I believe that this tale would improve immeasurably if Nicolae were more understandable--if we could relate to him in some way, as is usually the case with the better villains in literary history.

On the subject of Nicolae's powers, it has to be asked: what's the point? The whole mystique, and appeal, of the "Antichrist" archetype is that he's supposed to be a silver-tongued orator. Someone that everyone loves, and believes in. The "wolf in sheep's clothing." Yet, instead of having people convinced by Carpathia in the normal course of affairs, the authors give Carpathia magic powers to sway others to his will. Essentially, mind control. Mind control is boring and lame and removes the actual drama of these conflicts which *should be* that good people are deciding to follow Carpathia of their own free wills.

Also, Nicolae uses a cadre of thugs to enforce his will, and "bump people off" on occasion. Why would the mind-controlling Son of Satan need to resort to such thuggery? It's all just kind of silly.

The Antichrist should be a fascinating and ferocious villain. Nicolae Carpathia seems like an insipid bureaucrat. It's hard to understand why people would follow him (especially the incredible plans he's gotten away with in this series), or even elect him Postmaster General, let alone "Potentate." It's also hard to understand why the heroes of our series haven't yet used their close contact with Carpathia to try to take him out. Sure, pilot Steele doesn't think that Carpathia is slated to die yet, but wouldn't crashing their plane into a mountain be an interesting test of that hypothesis? It isn't even worth the old "college try"?

Ah well, the same-old issues continue to plague this series. There can be no drama when everything is planned out ahead of time (because: no suspense). For instance "The witnesses themselves continually referred to the folly of trying to harm them 'before the due time.' Bruce Barnes had explained...that, indeed, in due time God would allow the witnesses to become vulnerable, and they would be attacked. That incident was still more than a year and a half away...." Color me excited.

Another issue is the fact that the characters are so flat as to make other flat characters seem like Hamlet. As a for instance, take Amanda. If I were to write up all that I knew about Amanda, most of what I'd write down would be: "Her name is Amanda." She almost doesn't exist. All of LaHaye/Jenkins' heroes feel like the same person talking out of different names; I guess because they're all "believers," there's really not a lot of room for different motivations, etc., and none of them can be allowed to do anything morally questionable.

Also, it must be reiterated that the authors are clueless on what they're about. They make several references to the times in these novels being the worstest of the worstest... but... there's really not much to make it seem like this is so. Carpathia's world has some bombs going off, true, but otherwise doesn't seem that much worse for wear. While the media may be controlled, people seem to be able to work and live with a relative level of freedom and comfort. Contrast the world presented in these books with Soviet Russia, Nazi Germany or China during the Cultural Revolution, and you'll see what I'm talking about. Or, as a literary contrast, put this world up against Orwell's 1984 or Rand's Anthem. No contest--compared with these other places, Carpathia's world is pretty cushy.

All this said, I owe it to you (and the book, I suppose), to admit that this is probably the best of the series thus far. Buck's trip 'cross Israel/the Sinai was fairly compelling, and Ben-Judah's my favorite character. Of course, the "best of the series" is worth two stars, because the series is vastly flawed and in many ways. (And can we *please* stop the in-novel anti-abortion preaching? Or, if it must be there, can't it at least be intelligent, or fit within the story, or entertaining, or even compelling, or convincing, or *anything* other than an out-of-place story killer? And can someone explain why the heroes are certain that the child of the *Antichrist* wouldn't turn out to be Evil, like his dad?)

Two stars, and, oh man, there are nine books to go...

If you haven't started this series, please don't. Read the Bible instead; better book in every possible way.

"One of the best of the series"
If you stick with the series you will get to this wonderful jewel. I must say the first one was hard to get through. Tribulation Force addicted me to the series, even though it was not a great improvement. However, Nicolae is a serious improvement in plot and story. It is a great literal translation of many things in the Bible.

I don't let myself get tied into the argument of whether this or that should be taken literally or as a mere Allegory. The fact is that none of us really know. And at the end of the day you're reading a fiction story. If you start from the point of knowing you're reading a FICTIONAL story, your enjoyment for this family-oriented literary work, containing strong moral quality and lessons on proper Christian-based living will not falter.

The writers base the book on theology, but they do not claim to be starting a new religion, nor creating a new Bible. They are merely offering an interpretation of the events that occur in The Bible. Attempting to entertain using Biblical prophecy as their backdrop.

They are Christians and the series is written with Christian theology in mind. Christians believe certain things. I'm tired of people saying that having morals is equivalent to hate speech. The writers interpret events as they were written 2000 years ago. Neither Jerry Jenkins nor Dr. Tim LaHaye can be connected to hate speech for merely interpreting the words of various founders of our religion. If you're going to equate it to hate speech, you should point the finger at Jesus, the central figure of our religion. Frankly, I dare you to do that!

"Comments on the Entire Series"
I would just like to share that before I even began to read these Left Behind books, I went to a bible study and we did several studies on Revelation and covered all the judgments, seals, angels, trumpets, horsemen, etc. and this is actually extremely close to the Bible. Someone else on here made the comment that they're trying to take visions and apply them literally. Although I agree it might send a bad message that even if you don't believe when the rapture happens that you can still be saved, these books are excellent and Nicolae is my favorite thus far (no I haven't finished them all). The thing is though, do you want to be here when all that's going on? I wouldn't think so... Read the books, do some research in the Bible if you need to and enjoy. This isn't EXACTLY how it's all going to happen but these two authors have done a great job at trying to make a good story out of it and still stay true to the Bible.

"Great Book"
This book is Great !!! I could not put it down and read the whole thing in one day.

The third movie has nothing to do with this book so don't waste your time or movie on it.