The Last Four Things

June 13, 2011
In this underwhelming sequel to 2010's The Left Hand of God, escaped acolyte Thomas Cale is captured and returned to the forbidding Sanctuary, a massive fortress run by a sect of cruel monks who train their young male charges to become soldiers in their ongoing war against the Antagonists. Impressed by the darkly gifted young Cale, the Redeemer Bosco continues molding him to become the Angel of Death who will bring about the end of the world. As Cale becomes a renowned military leader and his mythical stature grows, he remains deeply troubled by personal questions, namely the betrayal of the beautiful Arbell Materazzi. While readers will be impressed by the depth of the setting and the elaborate action sequences, the lack of any substantial character development other than Cale's fretting over his insecurities leaves this installment with a classic case of middle book syndrome.

July 1, 2011

Second installment of Hoffman's bleak, ultra-violent pseudo-medieval trilogy, following The Left Hand of God (2010).

Redeemer General Bosco deems tormented boy-warrior Thomas Cale the Angel of Death, a suitable tool to help Bosco conquer the world, wipe out humanity and thus redeem it. Cale accepts the role, part of which involves a scheme to make Bosco the successor to the ailing Pope, despite numerous better-placed rivals. Scorning the brainwashed child-rabble that serves as the Redeemer army, Bosco helps Cale form a small but far more thoughtful and accomplished cadre of troops. After a few demonstrations of Cale's berserker skills, these Purgators believe in Cale utterly. One of them even invents gunpowder. Despite Cale's battlefield victories, the Redeemers still have powerful enemies, most consequentially the Laconics, who employ highly trained pederast mercenaries; Cale's engagement with them, the book's most significant battle, reenacts one that actually occurred during the Boer War. Beautiful Arbell Materazzi, Cale's lover and betrayer, complicates matters. Of Cale's former companions, Kleist enjoys adventures of his own, while Vague Henri eventually turns up accompanied by much jolly banter. Plotwise, that's about it. This time, the tone is predominantly grumpy. Hoffman continues to throw in random geographic references, mostly for comic relief (Spanish Leeds, for example, is in Switzerland). For the rest, readers will observe the erudite advantages conferred by an Oxford education, while the gnarled chunks of verbatim theology can only be interpreted as the author's grim attempt to manage the rage engendered by an overly zealous religious upbringing.

Less a novel than a fictionalized dissertation on angst.

(COPYRIGHT (2011) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

March 15, 2011

Death, then judgment, then heaven or hell. That's what the warrior-monks called the Redeemers are anticipating, as they train a horde of child slaves for a battle meant to end humankind. Thomas Cale was their protege, but in The Left Hand of God, the first book in this trilogy, he escaped. Now he's suffered the fate of every teenager--a broken heart--while wrestling with a newfound talent for violence. The first in the series, much touted and an international best seller, was hot here if not quite as hot here as expected; buy if the first one did well for you.

Copyright 2011 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.