Rapture Trilogy: Not as Enrapturing as Hoped

An Author-Requested Review

Title: Rapture

Author(s): Phillip W. Simpson
Publisher: Arete Publishing
Copyright: 2010
ISBN-10: 148394963X
ISBN-13: 978-1483949635
Format: ebook
Genre: Young Adult Dystopian
Part of Series: Part I of Rapture Trilogy
Rating: 2 1/2 out of 5

Phillip W. Simpson’s young adult novel, Rapture Trilogy, paints a dystopian world after the Biblical Rapture has occurred and the believers have been taken to heaven. Written in third-person, limited point-of-view we follow the teenaged protagonist, Sam, through a demon-infested landscape where the sun is blotted out, the moon is red as blood and ash continually falls from the sky, contaminating exposed water and food. Sam’s goal is to reach Los Angeles from his home in Jacob’s Ladder, Utah. Along the way he battles demon’s, trying to help the unbelievers left behind and fights beside the survivors holed up in caves and old businesses that remain standing after the earthquakes. But Sam is up to the challenge because he’s half-demon, half-human so has superior strength and speed coupled with life-long training in martial arts using the katana (long blade) & wakizashi (short blade). Of course, he has horns, which makes gaining survivors’ trust more difficult. Along the way, Sam befriends Joshua, who agrees to travel with him to Los Angeles, and together they save a girl named Grace from a group of roughen survivors. This unlikely trio makes their way across the brutal, post-Rapture landscape.

Simpson uses alternating chapters to give Sam’s background, which works well in telling us about Hikari and his daughter, Aimi who Sam loves, but slows the action a bit. His descriptions of both the setting and the fight scenes are engaging, but his characters lack depth. For instance, Sam is raised by Hikari, his sensei or teacher/foster-father who is, by all accounts in the novel, perfect. We learn through the flashbacks that Hikari takes Sam in as an infant from a Christian mother who was seduced by a demon. Hikari devotes his life to Sam’s martial arts training and Biblical education. Though Hikari was once a teacher, we have no idea how he supports Sam and Aimi. He seems to always be at home, that is when he’s not at church. How he provides for his family is a complete mystery. Aimi is also portrayed to perfection. She’s an obedient daughter who happily takes on the responsibility of cooking and cleaning for two men. On top of her household chores, Hikari trains Aimi in the martial arts almost as rigorously as he trains Sam, and all the while she maintains academic excellence and superior cheerleading skills. Excelling at everything she does is a bit unrealistic. No wonder Sam loves her, she is perfection incarnate. Neither Aimi nor Sam displays the rebellious nature that occurs in 98% of American teenagers. As an ex-high school teacher, I found that lack a little disturbing. Teenaged rebellion is part of growing up and developing self-identity.

While Phillip W. Simpson’s Rapture Trilogy provides us with a good escapism story, it lacks the depth and breadth of realism to make it worth a second read. Though the main character is the picture of social isolation, he lacks the rebellion, “to liberate himself or herself from childhood dependency on parental approval for always being the "good child." (Carl Pickard, PhD., “Surviving (Your Child’s) Adolescence”, Psychology Today December 6, 2009). Neither does Aimi, the quintessential “good child”. I doubt whether the teen population which Simpson’s targets will identify with either character.

Tent City: No Malingering in These Hills

An Author Requested Review

Title: Tent City

Author(s): Kelly Van Hull

Publisher: Kelly Van Hull
Copyright: 2013
ISBN-10: 1482754533
ISBN-13: 978-1482754537
Format: ebook, paperback (340 pages)
Genre: Young Adult, Speculative Fiction
Part of Series: Yes
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Not Quite a Dream Come True

 Who hasn’t wanted to run away from home? Like most teenagers, I dreamed about freedom from parental rules and taking charge of my own life. However, none of those dreams included my parents telling me to run away or insisting I take my younger siblings with me. That would have turned the dream into a nightmare! Yet that is exactly what happens to 17-year-old Dani and her 5-year-old brother, Brody, in Kelly Van Hull’s novel, Tent City.  This young adult fiction weaves a story realistic enough to be believable with a dystopian future. The story, in first person point of view, tells how  the Army, renamed the Council, under the leadership of General Burke controls all resources to “protect” citizens from starvation after locusts destroyed most of the crops. And now they want to “protect” children between the ages of five and eighteen.

Van Hull captures our sympathy immediately with the opening line, “It feels a lot like the night my brother Drake died.” In one line Van Hull ties creates reader empathy as well a scene tension as Dani’s parents sit her at the kitchen table and tell her she needs to run away with her little brother. Uncle Randy, who’s “high up” in the Army, has warned them that the Council “fears if too many more deaths occur, the human population may be in danger of extinction.” The answer, of course, is to put the children in safety camps where procreation may be assured. Van Hull shows us lingering uncertainties through Dani’s statement, “The year they took over is when most people died. Doesn’t that seem weird to you?” Hesitant to take on the sole responsibility of her brother, she’s given a choice between hiding in the cellar and running off to hide in the Black Hills. Dani chooses the latter. But she isn’t some self-assured, arrogant teenager. She questions her ability to take care of Brody on her own and insists that her best friend, Kit, comes with them.

The Ride of a Lifetime

This fast-paced ride begins as Dani, Brody and Kit head for Black Hills on the family’s four-wheelers. As they follow a map Dani’s father marked to their cabin and Kit proves her value by being the only one who can actually read it. The plot is riveting, regardless of your age, as we follow the trio deep into the woods. Dani gets her four-wheeler stuck in the river and the group is rescued by a mysterious travelling teenager named Jack. While Kit is flirtatious, Dani is cautious and sends him on his way post-haste.  Dani and Kit create an interesting dichotomy of characters. Kit’s practical skills are coupled with playfulness and Dani’s guardedness is combined with curiosity. These contradictory skills come in handy when the trio reaches their destination, only to find the cabin already occupied and surrounded by a small city of tents.

Tent City is of full of dichotomies. There’s Bentley, the hard-nosed community leader and the previously mentioned, mild-mannered Jack. They obviously know each other and don’t like each other, but denied this to Dani. Jack and Bentley are as opposite as Kit and Dani. Where Bentley is a harsh, Jack is compassionate; where Jack focuses on helping others with his healing skills, Bentley focuses on fighting and conducting raids for supplies. They are an irresistible puzzle to Dani, who must find out the secrets which seem to surround them both.

Kelly Van Hull crafts a compelling story filled with puzzles and opposites. Who are Jack and Bentley and how do they know one another? How can they both have such exceptional yet opposite skills? What does the “spiritual awakening” after the locusts have to do with the Council’s control? How can Dani protect Brody when she feels barely about to take care of herself? Will Dani, Brody and Kit ever be able to bet back home? The ride is worthwhile, so read Tent City and learn, as Dani does, that answers sometimes yield more questions.