[.ca] Assassins (ISBN 0842336826)

From Amazon.com:
Is it right to kill Satan's hit man? Would it help God's work? This installment in the Left Behind series picks up with Rayford Steele--"believer" and international fugitive--as he struggles with a plan to assassinate Antichrist Nicolae Carpathia. Meanwhile, Carpathia has been busy rebuilding roads, airports, and a cellular/solar satellite phone system--all designed to help him become supreme ruler of the world--and even claim himself to be God. We also find ace reporter Buck Williams anonymously preaching to the masses of believers and converts through his cyberspace magazine The Truth. All the believers in the safe house, including Buck, Doc, Chloe, and Tsion, are suspicious of Hattie--former mistress of Carpathia--who claims to be a believer but may have already compromised their secret location when she tried to buy her way to Europe months before. Fans of the series won't be disappointed. Jenkins's signature writing is at full force. Readers can count on a suspenseful plot, imaginative futuristic thinking, and familiar characters, all of which appear in the opening pages and are sustained until the last cliffhanger scene when God unleashes another earth-shattering disaster.

The Climax Esculates as the Great Tribulation Unfolds:
'Assassins: Assignment: Jersalem, Target: AntiChrist,' book #6 of the 'Left Behind series' reaches it's climatic confrontation of the forces of good and evil battle for supermacy in a world without leadership. A Horde of 200 million demonic horsemen slays a third of the world population. The Tribulation Force face the future as fugitives risking their lives to warn others of the Great Deception of the AntiChrist. It's here that history and prophecy come together in Jerusalem for the most breathless and explosive episode in a plot to destroy the AntiChrist as foretold in Revelation 13:1-2.

Not My Favorite Of The Series:
This one let me down a little. I love the series as a whole, but I think Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins had a cold streak on this one. Compared to The Mark or Soul Harvest it doesn't hold up. But ya can't go skippin' books now can you? Force your way through it. You don't even wanna know what I thought of The Indwelling. I'll skip that review.

Left Behind is spinning it's wheels:
I'll admit that I do enjoy this series of books. I'm hardly a Conservative Christian who is living each day for the Gorious Appearing of Jesus Christ, but I do enjoy a good end-times story as much as the next person. Granted you better be prepared for a whole lot of preaching and a single-minded viewpoint if you're going to read this series. The series officially turns the corner this time around as the Tribulation Force make plans for the assaination of Nicolae Carpathia. They know that God will select someone to do the deed and they all want the job, but in the end only one person will be responsible. And that person will probably die themselves. Meanwhile, the airhead stewardess, Hattie Durham, runs away from the safe house, supposedly to get a chance to kill her ex-hubby, Nicolae. This is a good thing, because she rarely appears in this novel. Hattie is a horrible caricature that LeHaye portrayed, and the series will be much better if she weren't in it. Basically, the story slowly progresses, leading to the assination at the end of the novel and a cliffhanger that they hope will make you want to come back for more. This is a good work of fiction, with an exciting storyline, but the characters are paper-thin and the dialogue is ridiculous. More then once I rolled my eyes when I read lines about characters "dropping to their knees and weeping" about Jesus. Only on staged evangelical shows will you ever see that. Personally, I pray for the people who are reading this series of novels as how they believe the future will play out. It's a very loose interpretation of the book of Revelations, but it is merely a work of fiction. Let's not forget that.

If you could kill a murderer, would you?:
What if you did have the power to stop a killer before he killed everyone you knew and loved? That is the question the plagues several main characters who are each determined to be the Assassin as prophesized in The Book of Revelations. This assassination is key to the transition for Nicolae Carpathia to fulfill the next step in his final days. Without this event he cannot claim to be God and raise himself from the dead. Rayford Steele wants to destroy the man who killed his wife Amanda. Buck Williams wants to reveal Nicolae as the AntiChrist through his cyberspace magazine. Tsion is determined to preach in Jerusalem, though it is more dangerous for him to do so than for any other man. Hattie Durham, the former airline stewardess and Carpathia's mistress, wants to vanquish the man who impregnated and then abandoned her. And those who were under the mind control of the AntiChrist, but have been freed, have their own special vengeance to deliver. So, the question is: The assassination begins the second half of the seven year tribulation, and it must be done, but when the motive is based in hatred, how can it be God's work? That's the conundrum I see. LaHaye and Jenkins address this question several times, but do not have an answer either. However, they seem to be riding the crest of their own writing and it has become stronger. Cliffhangers actually hang, surprises are just that, and the killer is unexpected. The question of right or wrong is a personal one. This is another adventure in the ride through the end-times. It is fiction, there is a great deal of doctrine liberally doled out, and it is based on the last book of the Bible. This one has good cliff hanging escapades throughout. I'm sure one of the reasons that I like this series is that the philosophy parallels my own. But such are all reviews - simply personal opinions. I've read six, and I'll read six more. Victoria Tarrani

A failure:
I am an ardent believer in Christ, but that does not mean that anything written about Christianity should be endorsed and embraced regardless of its quality. I have read all 12 of these novels and they simply aren't very good. The writing is poor, the plot unimaginative, and there certainly isn't anything in these books that will cause a Christian to re-examine and thus more fully embrace our beliefs. Look, I don't doubt that the authors had the best intentions with these books, but quality has to count for something. There are better alternatives out there. Try We All Fall Down by Caldwell. It's well-written and extreimly intelligent. If you're going to read about Christianity, read something that is worth your time.