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If this book were a graph chart, and the y axis measured levels of excitement, the x measuring page number, the line traveling along the x axis would flutter near the bottom until around the 200th page. Then it shoots up. Morals come crashing down on young Philip's teenage brain and the sense of clarity he gains is as satisfying to him as it will be to you, the reader.
As for the beginning, I was hoping to laugh more. Klauss is a writer for College Humor, and several endorsements on the cover sell the book's comedy. Personally, I felt that for all the promises other authors made about it being funny, it fell short. It shouldn't take over 150 pages to start chuckling when humor is what you're essentially promised.
However, the comments are not all off base; Klauss does an excellent job with charging the hero, Phillip, with asking questions that we all need to ask ourselves, our kin, and our mentors if we want to survive. Philip's story is not about the world physically ending; it's about what an end means to us, and thinking, loving, hating and guessing human beings. Bits of clarity sparkle in the beginning and middle, and by the end, like I said, understanding comes crashing down like a bucket of sun. I don't like to even give a shadow of a spoiler, but it's worth mentioning the device of how the story develops, because after 300 pages, you'll be glad you didn't put it down.
This book is a good read for teens, adults, atheists and christians, and well, everybody you wouldn't normally find in a room together. There isn't any strong alliance with one particular audience. Regardless of their various faiths and temperaments, the characters are people first, and believers second. Don't get impatient if the characters don't reveal the juiciest parts of their personalities. Like meeting people in real life, Klauss asks us to be patient in getting to know them.
The cover design, which Klauss himself admits is attractive, looks like the story reads. Much of it is raw and vibrant--but like one color, it sometimes begs for something a little more. Then, as if he anticipated that desire from wherever he was typing out Philip's coming of age, it explodes with well-tailored chaos.
