In classic in medias res fashion, Ted Dekker’s SAINT starts smack-center in a pulse-pounding situation already in progress: A man named Carl wakes up with no memory, finding himself strapped to a bed alongside a woman named Kelly, whom he thinks is his wife, who tells him their son has been kidnapped and they’re about to be killed.
Enter a man brandishing a 9mm pistol, who offers Carl a do-or-die bargain: Kill a designated couple at a nearby hotel within the hour and no harm will come to him or his family. Refuse, and that surgically implanted device in the back of Carl’s head will leak fatal chemicals. And this is just the first seven pages.
From there, SAINT is off and running on a narrative sprint worthy of recent Dean Koontz thrillers like VELOCITY and THE HUSBAND, and with just as many surprises. Almost just as soon as you’ve begun reading and Carl sets out to complete his spur-of-the-moment hit, we learn much of what we’ve been told is utter B.S., and that Carl is actually a highly specialized and trained assassin – code name: Saint – working for a shadowy organization called The X Group.
Instead, his real assignment is to kill the President of the United States, in order to prevent an Israeli disarmament policy from reaching fruition. Off goes Saint with Kelly – in reality, not his spouse, but one responsible for his brainwashing – in tow, to assassinate the leader of the free world without knowing why.
Did I mention Saint has the power to alter the temperature of his surroundings and the trajectory of bullets?
This SAINT is one crazy novel. With Dekker’s on-your-toes approach, anything can happen, which keeps you flying through the pages. Eventually, though, things have to hit a point of slowdown to allow for some breathing room. I much preferred the opening half – with such oddball scenarios as having target practice while encased in a coffin full of hornets – than the second, which grows less action-oriented and more introspective. It would be next to impossible to live up to such a breakneck beginning, anyway.
Dekker holds his cards a little too close to his chest for a little too long, but eventually we reach a point where we know all he does. By that time, the novel has changed completely, into a mano y mano confrontation that recalls the climax of an X-MEN sequel. This is not a bad thing, although it is a bit of a deflated balloon compared to the heights to which the novel initially soars.
Still, I enjoyed SAINT for the supernatural-tinged, spine-chilling ride it is. I likely would have enjoyed it more had I read Dekker’s 2006 novel SHOWDOWN, as this appears to be related, though not quite a sequel. –Rod Lott
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OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF THIS AUTHOR:
• HOUSE by Frank Peretti and Ted Dekker
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