Deadline by Randy Alcorn

Read while home alone? sure

Tissues needed? nope

Overall rating: 2 stars

Summary:

Three men who have been friends since childhood are spending a Sunday afternoon watching football together—as usual. At halftime they go out for pizza. That’s when the usual changes: there’s a horrible accident and all three land in the hospital. Only Jake Woods leaves the hospital alive. As the columnist tries to navigate a new world without his best friends, he receives an anonymous note that indicates it wasn’t an “accident.” Jake works with a police officer/buddy to uncover the truth about his friends and what led to their deaths.

Reaction:

The mystery/adventure of that summary caught my eye and I thought I’d really enjoy this book. Unfortunately there was also a lot of Christian political message permeating the story that was a turn off for me. I don’t mind discussing issues such as school vouchers, abortion, and gay rights, but I found that I didn’t enjoy it while reading a fiction book for pleasure.

Alcorn’s writing style also didn’t draw me into his story. There were too many details that didn’t seem necessary and quite a bit of text that I read as preachy. The resolution of the mystery was interesting, but I was tired of the book by that point and didn’t enjoy it as much as I might have.

There were also vivid descriptions of heaven from one character’s perspective. It was intriguing to read Alcorn’s version of heaven, but again some of the descriptions were too lengthy (and preachy) for my tastes. Although I didn’t enjoy this book much, it was interesting to read some opinions about a variety of controversial topics. 

You can read chapter one for yourself here.

I received a copy of this book free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review. The opinions (obviously!) are my own.

How do you feel about combining fiction and political commentary?