II really wanted to like this book. I gave it way past my 100 page rule. It had some genuine funny moments but ultimately it just kept dragging on without feeling like it was getting anywhere. I picked it up and put it down a bunch of times before about 60% of the way through the book I just didn't care anymore. I am quite sure others will like this but it was time for me to move on. ( )

Occasionally amusing is as apt a description as I can apply to this silly book. I think what the author was going for was something more along the lines of consistently hilarious in the vein of Douglas Adams. Alas, it is somewhat wide of that mark.

One area of shortcoming is the cast of characters. Instead of the hapless every man Arthur Dent, we get the wallflower journalist Christine Temetri, reporting on apocalyptic cults for a religious tabloid. Despite being the purported protagonist, you hardly notice she's even there after the first several chapters. Instead of the almost too cool Ford Prefect, the stranded alien from Betelgeuse, we have the randomly absurd Mercury, an angel of dubious reputation. He turns out to be not so much our sometimes charming guide through this absurd take on the end of the world as a sometimes charming instigator. And instead of the overconfident sometimes Galactic President and starship thief Zaphod Beeblebrox, we get the reticent full-time slacker and purported Anti-Christ Karl.

But if the reader allows themselves to overlook the underdeveloped characters, the contrived plot, Scripture twisting, and sometimes stilted dialog, the story and pop culture references are occasionally amusing. ( )

3.5 stars. Humorous, satirical fun. The accidental heroine, Christine Temetri, is correspondent for a religious news magazine, and is responsible for a column on the Apocalypse, aptly named End Times. She is joined by the disgraced angel, Mercury, to try and thwart the end of days, battling angelic and human foes with differing agendas. Together, they stumble through adventures and misadventures and lots of funny happenstances, like the linoleum salesman, who is creating portals to different planes. Good for a laugh.
( )

Mercury Falls
(Mercury #1)
by Robert Kroese
This is such a witty and fun book! Mercury is an Angel, one that has an assignment but he wasn't paying too much attention during the briefing. He knows it is about the Apocalypse but the details are fuzzy because he doesn't take good notes. He meets a reporter that is sick to death of the jobs she is sent on, "End of the World" type crackpots.
Through some hilarious adventures, they find the anti-Christ who happens to be a real loser named Carl. Carl really couldn't rule the world if he had to. The angels are trying to kill him and the fallen angels are trying to, well it's had to tell. They are not very organized. But they made bombs!
It's a fun read and very clever! ( )

Laughing loudly and frequently ( )