Wow. I mean, wow. This has been described as a rollercoaster ride and
that is so true. However, this is a rollercoaster which comes out of
the loading dock straight into a free-fall drop and never slows down
until the very end. Take The Da Vinci Code, add few more octanes of amphetamine-fueled energy and you get Comes a Horseman.
And that's the problem. As much as I love exciting, grand
conspiracy-fueled action-thriller novels, I also like a bit of breathing
room to take everything in, to allow my heartbeat to slow and my
adrenaline to drop back to its baseline level. I don't mind the action
getting a running start from the get-go, but, like any good
rollercoaster, you need some flat sections, some gentle curves before
your brain gets scrambled and your insides get rearranged by the next
loop-de-loop. Right up until the very end, Liparulo keeps the action at
a break-neck pace and by the time the finale rolls around, you as the
reader are just so damned tired you're more numbed than relieved when
the bad guy gets it and the battered yet satisfied main characters
return home. However, the story itself is so well-told, so
well-researched, with enough gruesome killings, conspiracies, and
misdirections, when that ending does come, you don't care that you have
the energy level of a beached jellyfish. You're just glad that it's
fiction (or, at least, one hopes it's fiction) and can set the book
aside for something a little more upbeat at the end of the day. And I
have to say that even though the plot does concern the advent of
Antichrist (that's right, just 'Antichrist', no 'the' involved) and the
Christian mythology which revolves around such a person, there's a level
of realism involved which makes the concept not only plausible, but
downright scary, as there're no metaphysical elements involved. No
appearance of the Devil, no singing of angels, just men who believe so
much in a particular destiny that they will do anything, kill anyone in
order to bring it about. And let me tell you, that's the scariest
thought of all because you know there are people out in the world today
psychotic enough to do just that a million times over. Hell, history is
full of such megalomaniacs and the advent of bigger and more
destructive weapons has made their quest for glory that much more bloody
and deadly.Read November 3-7, 2011
Originally reviewed on Goodreads November 11, 2011
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