Review – Storm Rising

Does an Ancient Book of Prophecy Hold the Answers to Saving the World . . . Or Predict Its Destruction? 

Mentioned in the pages of the Septuagint but lost to history, the Book of the Wars has resurfaced, and its pages hold secrets–and dangers–never before seen on earth.

Tasked with capturing the ancient text, former Navy SEAL Leif Metcalfe is finally given command of his own team. But their best efforts are ruined when a notorious Bulgarian operative known as “Viorica” snatches the volume right out from under them.

Iskra “Viorica” Todorova is determined to use the book to secure the thing that matters most–freedom. But a series of strange storms erupts around the globe and the coming dangers foretold in the text threaten crops, lives–entire nations.

Though both are haunted by secrets of their past and neither trusts the other, Leif and Iskra must form an uneasy alliance to thwart impending disaster. However, the truth hidden in two-thousand-year-old words could unleash the storm of their own destruction.

My thoughts: (Reviewed by Steve):   

“FROM THENCE THEY REMOVED, AND PITCHED ON THE OTHER SIDE OF ARNON, WHICH IS IN THE WILDERNESS THAT COMETH OUT OF THE COASTS OF THE AMORITES: FOR ARNON IS THE BORDER OF MOAB, BETWEEN MOAB AND THE AMORITES. WHEREFORE IT IS SAID IN THE BOOK OF THE WARS OF THE LORD, WHAT HE DID IN THE RED SEA, AND IN THE BROOKS OF ARNON, AND AT THE STREAM OF THE BROOKS THAT GOETH DOWN TO THE DWELLING OF AR, AND LIETH UPON THE BORDER OF MOAB.”

NUMBERS 21:13-15 (KJV)

The Book has been found . . . and the mysteries surrounding said book have military leaderships around the globe scrambling to obtain THE BOOK OF THE WARS OF THE LORD.  NAVY SEAL  Leif Metcalfe has been given command of his own team, and the opportunity to redeem himself from his previous failure, despite a 6 – month period of time of which he has no recollection.

Bulgarian operative Iskra “Virorica” Todorova is also seeking the book, for her own personal desire . . . freedom.   However, a series of strange global storms, coupled with dire predictions of future events, have forced Leif and Iskra into an uneasy alliance in order to thwart impending disaster.

In the end, will Leif and Iskra find the freedom they are so desperately seeking?

I normally devour Ronie Kendig’s writing.  However, I just couldn’t get into this particular book, for several reasons.

The book is large . . . not just in terms of pages.  It’s large in that it covers large areas of planet earth, much of which I’m not familiar with.  It contains many sub-plots, and those sub-plots develop over a large amount of time.  And this is just the first book in the series, which means the requisite “cliff-hanger” ending for this particular novel.

My biggest issue, however, stems from a personal bias – a prejudice, if you will.  I’ve never been a big fan of books that resurrect some obscure passage of scripture, and then unleash poetic license in megaton proportions.  My wife is an author, so I understand the imagination aspect of the craft.  But for me, the practice of eisegesis (reading something into the scriptures that may or may not actually be there) is not good.  God says what he means, and means what he says . . . human conjecture is not really necessary.

Ronie Kendig exhibits her usual nail – biting, gut – wrenching tension in her action scenes, putting the reader “into” the action as no one else can, and she develops the characters and their relationships so real that you feel you could recognize them on the street.  If you are looking to “escape” from reality, you could find no finer writer.