Glorious Appearing is the twelfth and final book in the Left Behind series.  Writers LeHaye and Jenkins are considering a sequel (presumably about the end of the Millennium) and a prequel, but I don't know when they'll be out.  I sure hope they're better than this book.

The end of the last book, Armageddon, left us with a cliff-hanger (literally!) of two Trib Force members at death's door.  Buck was blown off of a Jerusalem wall by a bomb, and Rayford lost control of his ATV and went tumbling over a cliff.  The last scene of the book describes an ambiguous death that could be either man.  The death is revealed in chapter two of Glorious Appearing. And that's the last decent chapter of the book.

I feel harsh criticizing someone else's work, but this book was really bad.  Most of the book was spent placing the characters who weren't killed off at various battle scenes, supposedly to tell the story from their points of view.  This became very tiresome, and the extent the authors went to to put them there stretched the limitations of believability.  Sure, it's fiction, but would an unknown foot soldier really be permitted to enter Carpathia's inner sanctum?  Doubtful.

And then Jesus appears.  I'm obviously not ruining the book, because we all know that's what it's about.  But the authors' portrayal of Jesus leaves much to be desired.  He flits in and out of sight, hovering in the sky on horseback at one scene, disappearing over the Mount of Olives the next.  But the most annoying thing was that Jesus was a regular Chatty Cathy.  Half the book is Jesus talking to the masses, mostly quoting scriptures.  I'm not trying to be sacrilegious, but I think when Jesus shows up, He's going to have something new and interesting and much more succinct to say.

And finally, toward the end of the book, the authors get into some really hinky theology about the Millennium.  For example, those born during the Millennium will have 100 years to decide whether or not to follow Jesus.  If they haven't chosen Him at the end of the 100 years, they die.  If they do choose Him, they live until the end of the Millennium.  This was all based on some obscure passage of Old Testament scripture.  They talked about numerous resurrections and judgments.  Worst of all was the authors' misinterpretation of the Sheep & Goats judgment.  According to the authors, the purpose of this judgment is to judge how everyone treated the Jewish people.  If you treated them well, you were a Sheep.  If you treated them poorly, you were a Goat.

In spite of giving this book an awful review, if you've been following the series, I encourage you to read this final installment.  If nothing else, you can find out who died at the end of Armageddon!

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