Review: Servant of an Angry God by Patrick Moses

Killer Justin Pointer didn’t realize what life was all about till he died.  In his meeting with St. Peter, he found out that God was willing to give him a second chance –putting his earthly skills of professional assassin to work for God himself.  But there is always a catch.

Pointer learns that the eternal battle between good and evil does exist, and his assigned job is to keep Victor Anson alive.  Once Anson had been one of God’s most avid followers, but has fallen away from the faith.  Now he is God’s Anti-Christ.  And Justin was going to be the one to keep him alive and away from the hand of the demon sent to set Anson on his path.  But the catch?  Pointer needs to follow the laws of the Lord, who does not take kindly to killing the possessed or the innocent.  Pointer needs to use his skills in the way God wants the game to be played.  And St. Peter was there to make sure those rules are followed!

The book is an interesting mix of underworld mobster turned right hand of God and biblical mythology.  The eternal war between God and the Anti-Christ is put into motion with a different kind of spin, in what appears to be the first book of a series.  The protagonist, Pointer, is well developed, and we find we hate him, and yet we can feel sympathy for him as he adjusts to “death” and the role he must play.  He is the ultimate hit man for hire, a professional in his field and now he is working for God.  He has been given a new body, and some better than human powers, but he is not immortal.  This does give him an advantage at times, but the main hindrance to his work is his inability to grasp the concept that his former life’s work under God’s guidance is not the same.  Thou shalt not kill the innocent is going to be a hard lesson for Pointer to grasp as he learns the rules of the game.

We are introduced to some interesting players:  St. Peter is a harsh taskmaster and not one to put the rules on the table unless pressed for them.  He is the ultimate conscious of Pointer, but usually just before Pointer is about to do something against the rules.  The book is filled with last minute turnarounds, as Pointer realizes his way of doing things does not fit in with God’s idea of doing things.

The main antagonist is Samael, whose main purpose is to get hold of Victor Anson and use him to bring about Armageddon.  Samael is an interesting ancient character and a professional wrestler whose superhuman strength makes him a deadly opponent.  He is sly, he is arrogant and he has lots of experience playing this game.

Pointer is not without allies.  Deputy Jim Moore becomes a believer and assists Pointer to the best of his human abilities.  We also have the sisters Michelle and Shannon who also become believers.  Michelle is the real estate sales person and Pointer’s love interest.  Shannon is Michelle’s protector and an emergency medical technician; very helpful in the situations Pointer gets himself into.

We also have some minor players who are loathsome creatures in their own right, but under the influence of Samael, they are evil incarnate.

The book is packed with adventure and in some cases it is a real page turner.  The book is well thought-out and planned.

But the book has the usual plague of self-published books.  Spelling and capitalization errors, punctuation problems and grammar issues, which all could be solved with a good editor.  The formatting of the book is also inconsistent, which could also be solved with some good editing. While Mr. Moses is a good writer, he really needs a good editor. Sometimes these errors are distracting and just messy.  A good cleanup would benefit this book.

Overall, the concept of the book, the character and plot development are very good and the adventure is nonstop.  I am looking forward to Mr. Moses’ next book in this series.

Links

Tales from the Pointy End

Amazon

Barnes & Noble