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A review by catchthesewings
Tribulation Force by Jerry B. Jenkins, Tim LaHaye
1.0
Left Behind: Tribulation Force is a baffling book that will make you laugh and cringe, all while putting you to sleep.
So, you’re a writer, and you have an idea for a series of books set in a dystopian future where Christians are hunted by a one-world government. You see the potential for drama, action, political intrigue, and some of the craziest imagery the Bible has to offer. But there’s a problem: you’re already one book in, and the pieces are nowhere near where you need them to be. Sure, you have the main players established, and they know where this Tribulation thing is headed, but the world of your book is still virtually unchanged from the one we live in now. The same countries are still in power, the political climate is peaceful, and there’s no hint of persecution seeping into government policy. And there’s another problem: all of your characters are stuck in suburban Chicago, but all the interesting parts of your story take place in Iraq and Israel. So, what do?
Well, I hope you wore sweatpants, because it’s time to move furniture — and a lot of it.
This is undoubtedly the predicament Tim LaHaye found himself in when it came time to write the second installment of his Christian Apocalyptic drama. He was anxious to reach the meat of the conflict, but had an inadequate setup to get there anytime soon. This leads to characters making decisions that are unmotivated or out-of-character just so that the plot can go where it needs to. It also means that the book as a whole lacks any overarching theme or storyline that connects the disparate subplots. The only subplot that carries through from the first chapter to the last is the romance between Chloe and Buck. But the romance can’t be the A-plot in a story like this, because it drives so little of the action and isn’t connected to the main conflict (Carpathia taking over the world). As a result, it becomes hard to pin down what the book on its own is about. The best I can say is that it’s about members of the church being pulled apart and put into positions of influence so that they can witness or impact events to come.
But even a statement like that indicates a flaw in the storytelling: our protagonists are passive throughout the entire plot. Now, having protagonists that don’t drive the plot forward is not an inherently wrong choice. The Empire Strikes Back is a great example of a story where the antagonists set the pace for the majority of the story. But there is a difference between a reactionary protagonist and a passive one. There is tension and intrigue when the heroes are barely keeping ahead of the villains, making plans, improvising when those plans fall apart. In Tribulation Force, there is none of that back-and-forth. Carpathia makes a play; Rayford, Buck, and Chloe watch CNN in horror and do... nothing. By the end of the book, Rayford and Buck are both put into positions of power through no effort of their own, and they do not use those positions to affect the plot. LaHaye presents us with the illusion of meaningful choices by filling scenes with endless minutia — mostly scenes of arranging travel plans or a mid-travel update on how Buck is flying first class. So, while I can tell you what happened in this book, I have a much harder time telling you what the characters did.
And now is as good a time as any to discuss our characters. In particular, I’d like to address this book’s female characters. Even more than the first book, Tribulation Force treats its female characters like garbage. Hattie is slut-shamed by every character in the book AND the narrator. Anytime she appears or is discussed, the male characters can’t help but think about how disgusted they are that she’s in a relationship with Carpathia, or how tragic it is that they introduced her to him, or how “she obviously didn’t get that position because of her brains.” Even Chloe climbs aboard the shame train to dish it out to Hattie. And speaking of Chloe, she is treated even worse than Hattie. In the first book, Chloe is at least a character with agency. She might be a little too perfect, but her entire subplot in the first book was one of self-actualizing, and her resolution was inherently a choice that only she could make. And the ending of that book made it seem like Chloe would be the brains of the opperation. She’s enthusiastic and smart, even if she isn’t in an influential position. In Tribulation Force, Chloe contributes not one iota to the plot, and she exists to be subdued or protected by our male characters. Rayford, Buck, and the narrator all express annoyance at Chloe’s talkativeness. In the first half of the book, she drops out of college to—no joke—learn to teach Sunday school, while Buck and Rayford are, respectively, taking over at a global newspaper and becoming the pilot of Air Force One. And I’m just not going to dive into the whole sexual purity angle when it comes to Chloe. It’s there, it’s problematic, moving on. While Chloe is viewed more highly by the author, I say she is treated worse than Hattie, because at least Hattie has some agency. By standing in opposition to the protagonists, Hattie moves the plot ahead (admittedly not by much) farther than Chloe does. Her choice to stay with Carpathia is also clearly *her* choice, not one that a man makes for her. So, even though Hattie is portrayed as a temptress, she at least chooses to be one, and that makes her a *slightly* stronger female character.
A side effect of the condescension our male heroes display toward the female characters is that it makes Rayford and Buck really hard to root for. Why should I hope Rayford and Buck can talk sense into Hattie, when they’ve done nothing but roll their eyes at her whenever she opens her mouth? In fact, none of our protagonists are given the chance to be the good guys. They never get a “save the cat” moment, even though Buck and Rayford are in perfect positions to have a little one-off adventure. If Rayford, say, stopped Air Force One from crashing, even though it was carrying the Antichrist, it would show us he values innocent lives in a way Carpathia clearly doesn’t. Or what if Buck managed to talk down one of the terrorists threatening the two witnesses, instead of letting them get burned to death with dragon breath? Without hero moments, we are left with only the flaws, and it makes it seem like Rayford and Buck have actually become worse as people since becoming Christians in the first book. And there it is again, that same creeping question from book one: “So what?” So what if the Christians win? The only Christians we saw were dicks. So what if Buck and Chloe get married? They aren’t a good couple. If you don’t like the main characters, “So what?” becomes the resounding cry at the end of every chapter.
##Eighteen months later
That’s right, the review is still going. This was such a bizarre part of the plot structure, I have to discuss it.
*SPOILERS for the end of Tribulation Force. You have been warned.*
Both Left Behind and Tribulation Force have a four-act structure, where Acts 1-3 are a normal three-act story, and Act 4 is the last chapter or two. Act 4 is the cliffhanger that sets up the status quo for the next book. In Tribulation Force, Act 4 takes place eighteen months after the plot proper ends. The bizarre thing is that 80% of the things that happen in Tribulation Force happen in these final two chapters. Not only do Buck and Chloe get married — we are introduced to Amanda, Rayford’s love interest (who got a blink-and-you-miss-it mention earlier in the book), and they also get married. Then, out of nowhere, Buck gets a call from the President as a head’s up that WWIII is about to start. Bruce falls into a coma, and then his hospital is bombed in the first wave of the war, and Bruce dies. Finally, we learn that Washinton DC and London have both been obliterated.
I do not understand why this came at the end of book two. The events of Act 4 are so disconnected from the rest of the plot that it felt like a completely different book. The eighteen month time jump would not have been jarring had it happened in the break between books.
I guess this section of the story got pushed forward so that something actually happens in book two? Even so, you don’t get credit for a sudden plot twist if you have done none of the legwork to set it up.
At the very least, Tim LaHaye is finally where he always wanted to start. The peacetime is over. Let the misery begin.
So, you’re a writer, and you have an idea for a series of books set in a dystopian future where Christians are hunted by a one-world government. You see the potential for drama, action, political intrigue, and some of the craziest imagery the Bible has to offer. But there’s a problem: you’re already one book in, and the pieces are nowhere near where you need them to be. Sure, you have the main players established, and they know where this Tribulation thing is headed, but the world of your book is still virtually unchanged from the one we live in now. The same countries are still in power, the political climate is peaceful, and there’s no hint of persecution seeping into government policy. And there’s another problem: all of your characters are stuck in suburban Chicago, but all the interesting parts of your story take place in Iraq and Israel. So, what do?
Well, I hope you wore sweatpants, because it’s time to move furniture — and a lot of it.
This is undoubtedly the predicament Tim LaHaye found himself in when it came time to write the second installment of his Christian Apocalyptic drama. He was anxious to reach the meat of the conflict, but had an inadequate setup to get there anytime soon. This leads to characters making decisions that are unmotivated or out-of-character just so that the plot can go where it needs to. It also means that the book as a whole lacks any overarching theme or storyline that connects the disparate subplots. The only subplot that carries through from the first chapter to the last is the romance between Chloe and Buck. But the romance can’t be the A-plot in a story like this, because it drives so little of the action and isn’t connected to the main conflict (Carpathia taking over the world). As a result, it becomes hard to pin down what the book on its own is about. The best I can say is that it’s about members of the church being pulled apart and put into positions of influence so that they can witness or impact events to come.
But even a statement like that indicates a flaw in the storytelling: our protagonists are passive throughout the entire plot. Now, having protagonists that don’t drive the plot forward is not an inherently wrong choice. The Empire Strikes Back is a great example of a story where the antagonists set the pace for the majority of the story. But there is a difference between a reactionary protagonist and a passive one. There is tension and intrigue when the heroes are barely keeping ahead of the villains, making plans, improvising when those plans fall apart. In Tribulation Force, there is none of that back-and-forth. Carpathia makes a play; Rayford, Buck, and Chloe watch CNN in horror and do... nothing. By the end of the book, Rayford and Buck are both put into positions of power through no effort of their own, and they do not use those positions to affect the plot. LaHaye presents us with the illusion of meaningful choices by filling scenes with endless minutia — mostly scenes of arranging travel plans or a mid-travel update on how Buck is flying first class. So, while I can tell you what happened in this book, I have a much harder time telling you what the characters did.
And now is as good a time as any to discuss our characters. In particular, I’d like to address this book’s female characters. Even more than the first book, Tribulation Force treats its female characters like garbage. Hattie is slut-shamed by every character in the book AND the narrator. Anytime she appears or is discussed, the male characters can’t help but think about how disgusted they are that she’s in a relationship with Carpathia, or how tragic it is that they introduced her to him, or how “she obviously didn’t get that position because of her brains.” Even Chloe climbs aboard the shame train to dish it out to Hattie. And speaking of Chloe, she is treated even worse than Hattie. In the first book, Chloe is at least a character with agency. She might be a little too perfect, but her entire subplot in the first book was one of self-actualizing, and her resolution was inherently a choice that only she could make. And the ending of that book made it seem like Chloe would be the brains of the opperation. She’s enthusiastic and smart, even if she isn’t in an influential position. In Tribulation Force, Chloe contributes not one iota to the plot, and she exists to be subdued or protected by our male characters. Rayford, Buck, and the narrator all express annoyance at Chloe’s talkativeness. In the first half of the book, she drops out of college to—no joke—learn to teach Sunday school, while Buck and Rayford are, respectively, taking over at a global newspaper and becoming the pilot of Air Force One. And I’m just not going to dive into the whole sexual purity angle when it comes to Chloe. It’s there, it’s problematic, moving on. While Chloe is viewed more highly by the author, I say she is treated worse than Hattie, because at least Hattie has some agency. By standing in opposition to the protagonists, Hattie moves the plot ahead (admittedly not by much) farther than Chloe does. Her choice to stay with Carpathia is also clearly *her* choice, not one that a man makes for her. So, even though Hattie is portrayed as a temptress, she at least chooses to be one, and that makes her a *slightly* stronger female character.
A side effect of the condescension our male heroes display toward the female characters is that it makes Rayford and Buck really hard to root for. Why should I hope Rayford and Buck can talk sense into Hattie, when they’ve done nothing but roll their eyes at her whenever she opens her mouth? In fact, none of our protagonists are given the chance to be the good guys. They never get a “save the cat” moment, even though Buck and Rayford are in perfect positions to have a little one-off adventure. If Rayford, say, stopped Air Force One from crashing, even though it was carrying the Antichrist, it would show us he values innocent lives in a way Carpathia clearly doesn’t. Or what if Buck managed to talk down one of the terrorists threatening the two witnesses, instead of letting them get burned to death with dragon breath? Without hero moments, we are left with only the flaws, and it makes it seem like Rayford and Buck have actually become worse as people since becoming Christians in the first book. And there it is again, that same creeping question from book one: “So what?” So what if the Christians win? The only Christians we saw were dicks. So what if Buck and Chloe get married? They aren’t a good couple. If you don’t like the main characters, “So what?” becomes the resounding cry at the end of every chapter.
##Eighteen months later
That’s right, the review is still going. This was such a bizarre part of the plot structure, I have to discuss it.
*SPOILERS for the end of Tribulation Force. You have been warned.*
Both Left Behind and Tribulation Force have a four-act structure, where Acts 1-3 are a normal three-act story, and Act 4 is the last chapter or two. Act 4 is the cliffhanger that sets up the status quo for the next book. In Tribulation Force, Act 4 takes place eighteen months after the plot proper ends. The bizarre thing is that 80% of the things that happen in Tribulation Force happen in these final two chapters. Not only do Buck and Chloe get married — we are introduced to Amanda, Rayford’s love interest (who got a blink-and-you-miss-it mention earlier in the book), and they also get married. Then, out of nowhere, Buck gets a call from the President as a head’s up that WWIII is about to start. Bruce falls into a coma, and then his hospital is bombed in the first wave of the war, and Bruce dies. Finally, we learn that Washinton DC and London have both been obliterated.
I do not understand why this came at the end of book two. The events of Act 4 are so disconnected from the rest of the plot that it felt like a completely different book. The eighteen month time jump would not have been jarring had it happened in the break between books.
I guess this section of the story got pushed forward so that something actually happens in book two? Even so, you don’t get credit for a sudden plot twist if you have done none of the legwork to set it up.
At the very least, Tim LaHaye is finally where he always wanted to start. The peacetime is over. Let the misery begin.