Ere His Floods Of Anger Flow by John Harmer

This book is written especially for members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. It's a fictional portrayal of what might happen in the years before the second coming of Jesus Christ. We follow the experiences of a dozen or so people as they survive or die during storms, plagues, famines, and other disasters.

General rating: 4 out of 4

1. Was it plausible? Absolutely. I think this is what I liked best about this book. It's probably the most plausible apocalyptic book I've read. Everything that the author portrayed could easily take place. Apocalyptic or not, any one of the things he wrote about could happen any day anywhere in the world.

2. Was it thought provoking? Yes. I thought a lot about my own degree of preparation for any large-scale disaster. Do I have emergency supplies? Am I prepared to follow the direction of my local leaders? Could I survive in the various scenarios he suggested? I actually was prompted to make a few changes in my own life as a result of reading his ideas of what could happen.

3. Was it engaging? Yes. Very, especially after the first few chapters.

4. Was it uplifting? Strangely, yes it was. I hate reading books like this and turning the last page with the primary idea that the world will "burn" and everyone (save a lucky few) will die. Nobody has any control over anything. Ugh. This book was not like this. People died and people lived. Survival--or not--depended on being in the right place at the right time, or on being inspired to take action in advance of the trouble, and some of it depended on following the counsel already given by prophets: store food for emergencies, get out of debt, be loyal to your local leaders. In other words, individuals making good decisions often were protected from disaster. Some weren't, but some were and I liked that idea of an individual having a measure of control over what happened to him or her. The idea that a person who consistently makes righteous decisions will have a chance to survive a disaster really appealed to me. So yes, this book was uplifting. It didn't extinguish all hope of surviving disasters.

Language: no bad language at all
Sex: other than reports of widespread pornography and other sexual deviances, there were no portrayals of sex.

My recommendation: It was worth reading. Much to my surprise, I really liked it.