Book Review - In His Image by James Beauseigneur
Category Book Reviews
A friend recommended The Christ Clone Trilogy to me as a recreational read, so I figured I'd start out at book 1... In His Image by James Beauseigneur. I'll give books 2 and 3 a try, but I'm hoping they are better than the first one.
A newspaper reporter, Decker Hawthorne, figures out a way to get himself on a team that is investigating whether the Shroud of Turin is authentic. A few years after the team comes up with their conclusion (it's not), one of the scientists finds living DNA on the Shroud and is able to clone those cells into a living human, Christopher... essentially the clone of Christ if the shroud was real. Through a disaster causing worldwide deaths (supposed to be the Rapture), the United Nations takes on a much more important role in the world, and Decker ends up as the main staffer to the guy who becomes the Secretary General of the UN. Decker also ends up becoming the guardian of Christopher when his "parents" die off in the disaster. Christopher knows the story of his origin, and shows some remarkable powers. He's also seen by a group of "New Age" leaders as the person to lead the world to a new era of peace and prosperity. Add in Israeli/Arab conflicts, apocalyptic wars, and one world rule, and you sort of see where this is going. At the end of the book, Christopher takes off for a 40 day fast and comes back convinced of his mission and calling in the world, whatever that might be...
While I want to like this book, I can't wholeheartedly recommend it (yet). There are a large number of plot holes where important events and facts (in my opinion) are just bypassed, and the story jumps forward a number of years or months. It also suffers a great deal when you draw the inevitable comparisons to the Left Behind series, even though this one came first. I understand that books two and three are supposed to be much better, so I'm clinging on to some level of hope that my time spent reading this will be rewarded. This is definitely not a book that stands on its own without the support of future books, so I'll reserve full judgement until then. But at this point in time, I'd have to rate this book average at best...
A friend recommended The Christ Clone Trilogy to me as a recreational read, so I figured I'd start out at book 1... In His Image by James Beauseigneur. I'll give books 2 and 3 a try, but I'm hoping they are better than the first one.
A newspaper reporter, Decker Hawthorne, figures out a way to get himself on a team that is investigating whether the Shroud of Turin is authentic. A few years after the team comes up with their conclusion (it's not), one of the scientists finds living DNA on the Shroud and is able to clone those cells into a living human, Christopher... essentially the clone of Christ if the shroud was real. Through a disaster causing worldwide deaths (supposed to be the Rapture), the United Nations takes on a much more important role in the world, and Decker ends up as the main staffer to the guy who becomes the Secretary General of the UN. Decker also ends up becoming the guardian of Christopher when his "parents" die off in the disaster. Christopher knows the story of his origin, and shows some remarkable powers. He's also seen by a group of "New Age" leaders as the person to lead the world to a new era of peace and prosperity. Add in Israeli/Arab conflicts, apocalyptic wars, and one world rule, and you sort of see where this is going. At the end of the book, Christopher takes off for a 40 day fast and comes back convinced of his mission and calling in the world, whatever that might be...
While I want to like this book, I can't wholeheartedly recommend it (yet). There are a large number of plot holes where important events and facts (in my opinion) are just bypassed, and the story jumps forward a number of years or months. It also suffers a great deal when you draw the inevitable comparisons to the Left Behind series, even though this one came first. I understand that books two and three are supposed to be much better, so I'm clinging on to some level of hope that my time spent reading this will be rewarded. This is definitely not a book that stands on its own without the support of future books, so I'll reserve full judgement until then. But at this point in time, I'd have to rate this book average at best...
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Posted by null At 12:20:16 On 28/11/2008 | - Website - |