The Last Day

Rating:
Summary: Thriller of the Highest Order
Review: THe Last Day is one great thriller and very artfully crafted. I very much enjoyed how tightly the author tied all of his subplots at the end. Rarely can one find a book that is thoroughly entertaining and thought-provoking. Two big thumbs up.

Rating:
Summary: WOW!
Review: Read this book in one sitting, which I never do and can ill afford. Loved the way the author gave voice to women, disenfranchised for centuries from established religions. He really gave 'em hell. Loved it.

Rating:
Summary: Ho-Hum
Review: Fairly lifeless thriller with some cheesy writing and unpleasantly dull characters. At times the author's style is awkward, most often stupefying. The messiah named Jeza is one hellish nag for the reader to endure and her unending parables are as half-baked as her character. The book takes forever to go absolutely nowhere. The only place readers will be taken is for 20 bucks. A schlocky torment when it isn't plain tedious.

Rating:
Summary: An Unfair Comparison
Review: I believe it is very unfair to compare this book to Stone's "Damascus Gate". With Stone we are talking about an exquisite writer whose novel is insightful and meaningful. While "Last Day" takes place similarly in the Middle East at the millenium, it is a rather pedestrian thriller that's very badly done. I gave it a five for the kind of thing it is, but Stone is on an entirely different scale. It's like comparing a Yugo with a Rolls. One has beauty, craftsmanship, and lasting value. Kleier's Yugo is a piece of junk that can only be compared with others within its own cheap class for a short run. Sure, they both run, but if the price were the same, I'd skip that Yugo and go for something of value.

Rating:
Summary: Staggering
Review: I was mesmerized by what passes for dialogue, character development, and story telling technique in this novel. Not one character behaves in a plausible manner, especially the putative messiah. One gets the impression that the author knows nothing about theology or the bible. Even more disconcerting is how clueless he is about human nature. Much of the book details the author's personal grudge against religion and other more interesting aspects of the plot are ignored. The plot potential is staggering and the inability of the writer to effectuate it is disheartening. I'm afraid Kleier is just not up to the task he set for himself either intellectually or in writing faculty.

Rating:
Summary: Offensive
Review: I have to agree with the reader from PA who said that as a woman she found the character of "little Jeza" offensive. Jeza could offend anyone! This character proves the author understands as little about women as he does about writing. Particularly outrageous is that the females in this book are more concerned with their boyfriends than the spiritual significance of the messiah's return. This "but what about us?" attitude made me sick. Only the male characters have thoughts about the spiritual implications and these are superficial. All the characters are shallow but the women are really vapid. They are symptomatic of the unenlightened novel this author has attempted.

Rating:
Summary: Engaging Read!
Review: I couldn't put this book down. I found the exploration of the question, "What would a higher being have to say about the state of the world today" a fascinating one. Making it more compelling was that the story was told through the jaundiced eye of the media. As a woman, I was particularly moved by seeing world religions distilled through a female filter--finally! Readers will particularly like the ending which was both shocking and moving. I rarely recommend books--but I do endorse reading The Last Day.

Rating:
Summary: Oh, Jeza...
Review: Please, don't anyone go into shock, but I think this is a one of the worst written and bubble-headed books I have read in a long time. Having e-mailed some like-minded contributors to these proceedings, I can assure everyone that I am not alone in this conclusion.
The author's grasp has truly exceeded his grasp in what is an inordinately ambitious first novel for a talentless writer. Not even great novelists successfully tackle the intractable issue of religion very often, but to do so without knowledge or understanding is inviting the sort of disaster with which Kleier presents us. A compulsive hostility towards the Church, a complete unfamiliarity with eschatological scholarship, and a simple-minded obsession with the aphorisms of self-help books is part of the author's undoing. But inconceivable palaver as dialog and the poorly realized characters are arguably the most conspicuous fugitives from an editor's red pencil to cross a page in recent memory. And then, of course, there is Jeza, the messiah who never read the New Testament herself but heard it was really good. Just needs some updating. An entire book could be written simply on how annoying Jeza is.
To demonstrate what an ultimate failure Kleier's is, compare it to Robert Stone's Damascus Gate. Stone's novel, though flawed, addresses the issues of the millenium with intelligence, thought, and grace. It succeeds brilliantly as "thriller as literature." It is everything Last Day is not and Stone is the fine writer that, without the divine interention of Jeza, Kleier will never be.

Rating:
Summary: A good point
Review: ...The Last Day offers a plethora of beautful parables, maxims and aphorisms, not to mention some terrific action and nerve-racking suspense. All exceptionally well written. Here's one of a thousand examples I can cite--a taste of the real "steak," (pg 228): "A prominent D.C. defense attorney stepped up to Jeza with an attractive young thing on the arm of his expensive suit. 'Miss Jeza, I believe you and I have something rather significant in common. We're both in the same business--the business of saving people!' Jeza regarded him critcally for a moment and then bluntly replied, 'Yes, but my means of salvation do not render people penniless!" This is a superb novel, and I rest my case!

Rating:
Summary: weird
Review: Folks have every right to acclaim the book as "brilliant", but why, as my son would say, get "weirded out" when less than kudos are posted. Someone is seeing phantoms and getting apoplexy whenever a counter-view is sent in. The nasty comments and vindictive attitude on the part of some "10's" here reflect much of what I didn't like in the novel itself. I won't criticise the religious message; I found some of it compelling. But Jeza was a screeching banshee more than messiah. The idea that the Catholic Church is the root of all evil is particularly disquieting. The concept of a female savior is appealing, but I would think the Holy Mother a more realistic model than rampaging New Age feminist. As far as the author's writing, it is not a strong point of the book, but worse is published every day. Now, those are my ideas about the book; how about respecting them for one opinion that might differ from yours?
It has taken me a while to work-up my nerve to post here because the positive reviews have taken such an intimidating tone. Let's not shut others out because their opinions of books are different and discourage people from reviewing here. We might learn something from them.