Nicolae by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B Jenkins

Nicolae Carpathia has now established himself as the leader of the world by orchestrating a treaty between Israel and Egypt. He has seized the control the world gave him after the disappearances. The Global Community has been firmly established. Rayford Steele and Buck Williams are walking the line by serving Jesus Christ and serving Nicolae Carpathia at the same time. Tsion Ben-Judah, a world-renowned Jewish scholar, has shocked the world by publicly professing that Jesus is the Messiah the prophets spoke of. Nicolae sees him as an automatic threat and attempts to snuff him out deceptively, thus forcing the Trib Force to take Tsion into their care. As the time nears for the wrath of the Lamb earthquake to shake the earth, the Trib Force does their best to prepare for and warn others about the looming catastrophe, but most of the world has already turned their hearts toward the Antichrist.

Nicolae

is a transitional novel in the series between the earlier judgements and the famed wrath of the Lamb earthquake. Because it is a transitional novel, there are not many outstanding qualities, good or bad. In the end, the rating comes out average.

The character development done in Tribulation Force comes to a halt seemingly because Buck and Chloe and Rayford and Amanda are married. Tsion, the new perfect mentor character is a worse character than Bruce because of his constant pithy sayings and Scripture quotations and general care for all mankind. I have nothing against mentor characters; an End Times series needs a mentor character to keep the reader up with Scripture, but mentors do not have to be perfect. Because there are already too many characters in this series, the authors are taking shortcuts on character development.

Seemingly to fill time, the authors had Buck preform a lengthy rescue mission in Israel. It seems as though the authors are using the label "End Times" as an excuse to write cheap action fiction. The fact that Buck and Rayford work for the GC only adds to this because they are able to manipulate things from the inside. To compound this, more and more Christians are discovered on the inside.

All in all, Nicolae is an average novel whose only purpose to bring the series into the next era of judgements. Hopefully the authors will be more diligent in their efforts next time.

2.5 stars