*Gasp* No way!

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Postby Yumie » Tue Mar 28, 2006 10:28 am

It would be my guess that maybe Ted came up with the majority of the plot of the first half and Frank came up with the majority of the plot for the second half, but ultimately I'm pretty sure they probably both did the writing together. Otherwise the way the book would read would seem inconsistent, because their styles are different.

Anyways, the most depressing thing ever happened. -_- For my birthday, my nana wanted to get me a present, and she asked my mom what she should get me. And my mom told her to get me a gift card to the Christian bookstore, so I could buy House when it came out. And that would have been great! But then, my cousins and aunt told her to just buy it off of Amazon! And she did! So now, I have to wait for it to get here. . . which wasn't so bad until yesterday. I went to Waldenbooks, and what do you think was sitting there on the shelf, five days before its release date? That's right. House. If my grandmother had given me a gift card, I'd have just gone ahead and bought House yesterday and gotten something else at the bookstore. But instead, I had to leave it in the store and come home to miserably and dramatically await a shipment from amazon. Depressing.
Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art
Thou my best Thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word;
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord;
Thou my great Father, I Thy true son;
Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.

Be Thou my battle Shield, Sword for the fight;
Be Thou my Dignity, Thou my Delight;
Thou my soul’s Shelter, Thou my high Tower:
Raise Thou me heavenward, O Power of my power.

Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise,
Thou mine Inheritance, now and always:
Thou and Thou only, first in my heart,
High King of Heaven, my Treasure Thou art.

High King of Heaven, my victory won,
May I reach Heaven’s joys, O bright Heaven’s Sun!
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
Still be my Vision, O Ruler of all.
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Postby Rogie » Tue Mar 28, 2006 11:50 am

You mean Waldenbooks already has it? I guess that might be a store-specific thing, but it's worth checking into.
Zar wrote:Praise God for all things awesome. Life ROCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But sanctify the Lord your God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:
-- 1 Peter 3:15
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Postby Pent » Tue Mar 28, 2006 12:15 pm

It would be my guess that maybe Ted came up with the majority of the plot of the first half and Frank came up with the majority of the plot for the second half


Actaully Dekker came up with almost the entire plot while some things here and there where added in by Perreti.

I just got the book yesterday. It's been out at a lot of different stores for while now. Not just store specific.
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Postby Yumie » Tue Mar 28, 2006 1:50 pm

Rogie wrote:You mean Waldenbooks already has it? I guess that might be a store-specific thing, but it's worth checking into.


You should definitely check, Rog. Most Waldenbooks get things in at least a week before they are released.

And Jack, since you already have the book. . . no spoilers! :-P
Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art
Thou my best Thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word;
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord;
Thou my great Father, I Thy true son;
Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.

Be Thou my battle Shield, Sword for the fight;
Be Thou my Dignity, Thou my Delight;
Thou my soul’s Shelter, Thou my high Tower:
Raise Thou me heavenward, O Power of my power.

Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise,
Thou mine Inheritance, now and always:
Thou and Thou only, first in my heart,
High King of Heaven, my Treasure Thou art.

High King of Heaven, my victory won,
May I reach Heaven’s joys, O bright Heaven’s Sun!
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
Still be my Vision, O Ruler of all.
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Postby Warrior 4 Jesus » Tue Mar 28, 2006 10:14 pm

Ted Dekker came up with the premise, but Frank Peretti and He wrote half each and then worked through it, revising together.
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Postby Pent » Wed Mar 29, 2006 10:34 am

Yea.

Anyways I finished it. If your a Ted Dekker fan you'll notice some connections to hs other books. If your a Perreti fan you'll like the book to I'm sure.

All I can say about the book is XD!
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Postby LittleShepherd » Mon Apr 10, 2006 3:00 pm

I'm about halfway through House right now, and so far it's okay. Some of the things going on in the book seem kind of out of left field, but I understand it's supposed to keep you guessing. I'm sure they'll clear things up before the end.

I have pretty high hopes for this book even though Dekker's been a really mixed bag. Blink and the Circle trilogy were awesome. Showdown and Three both left me more than a little underwhelmed, though. Showdown for being boring and for handling its connections to the Circle trilogy so sloppily. I hate when writers are sloppy and inconsistent with their own canon. Three for being really good, and for keeping me guessing, only to hit me with one of the most boring, cliche endings ever.

I won't spoil them for you, but Three almost had me ready to cry because I'm a pretty slow reader, and I had to sink a lot of time into what I thought was a good book only to have it completely spoiled by the junk at the end. :sniffle:
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Postby That Dude » Mon Apr 10, 2006 5:04 pm

That's pretty funny about that LittleShepard...I actually thought that the Circle trilogy had to be the worst of Dekker's that I've read...While Thr33 was one of the best. And even though it had that ending it still kept you guessing till the last few pages.
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Postby Kawaiikneko » Fri Apr 21, 2006 5:27 pm

I read it in about 5 hours yesterday, and while it was good it probably wasn't the best book I've ever read. Maybe its because I read it too fast XD; That says something though. I've been having trouble getting into books lately and this one dragged me right in.

the ending was slightly predictable though. The beginning was GREAT though. Very suspenseful. It got harder to understand (weirder) near the end, but ended well, if a little quickly and cliche-ishly.
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Postby Yumie » Sat Apr 22, 2006 9:25 am

I read this book and liked it, but, I was disappointed in the fact that it was so very much like Showdown. I mean, Susan was so similar to. . . what's the kids name in Showdown? The one who is the son of the director of the school? Anyways, I know it's got to be hard to keep coming up with awesome original plots, but for two to so closely mirror eachother is a little depressing, especially if you spent $25 on both and you wind up feeling like you're kinda reading the same story. But it had enough differences that it was worth it anyways.

And I thought Thr3e was the best too, I didn't predict the ending at all, and it was still original even though other people had done it before because it was completely based on that one Scripture verse. I thought the book was amazing. Blink was awesome too, but I sort of got bored with the Circle trilogy and never read more than the first book. I want to try to read the other two eventually though.
Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art
Thou my best Thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word;
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord;
Thou my great Father, I Thy true son;
Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.

Be Thou my battle Shield, Sword for the fight;
Be Thou my Dignity, Thou my Delight;
Thou my soul’s Shelter, Thou my high Tower:
Raise Thou me heavenward, O Power of my power.

Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise,
Thou mine Inheritance, now and always:
Thou and Thou only, first in my heart,
High King of Heaven, my Treasure Thou art.

High King of Heaven, my victory won,
May I reach Heaven’s joys, O bright Heaven’s Sun!
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
Still be my Vision, O Ruler of all.
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Postby LittleShepherd » Sat Apr 22, 2006 2:50 pm

It's understandable that you saw House as somewhat similar to Showdown. In some ways it's considered the "second book" in the Showdown series. While not a strict sequel, it and the next four or five books are supposed to cover many of the same themes. Oh, yeah. I finally finished House myself, and it's yet another disappointment. After reading Showdown, Thr33, and House back to back, and being let down by all of them, I'm not sure I'll be picking up any more of his books.

Oh, and the ending to House really upset me. I won't spoil it for anyone else, but I wonder if anyone else got the impression that I did.
"I wish I could prove I love you, but does that mean I have to walk on water?" - Hikaru Utada, Simple and Clean
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Postby Kawaiikneko » Sat Apr 22, 2006 2:58 pm

put your impression in spoilers and let's find out...

I found House to be alot like the Oath as well...
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Postby LittleShepherd » Sat Apr 22, 2006 7:08 pm

Kawaiikneko wrote:put your impression in spoilers and let's find out...

I found House to be alot like the Oath as well...

Alright. Here's my impressions on the ending of house. It's chock full of spoilers, so you have been warned.
[SPOILER]I really didn't like the ending of House. Not necessarily the events. Finding out the girl was a physical manifestation of an angel(or maybe Jesus himself -- it's never specified) was alright, though I found the whole death/resurrection thing kind of goofy and repetitive after reading Showdown.

That's not the part that bothered me the most, though. Leslie's death probably bothered me the most. She was the first one in the group to start feeling remorse and to connect the entire ordeal with her past sins finally catching up to her. She even admitted everything, admitted that she deserved it, and seems like she would have gotten the hint if the little girl had talked to her. But in the end she died, and the authors' horrible, unsympathetic mary-sue "Ken & Barbie" characters get all the special treatment and get to live. :drool:

To me, the book might as well have been subtitled "Want to live? You better be beautiful." While it's not the worst book I ever read, it's certainly not something I consider fulfilling. When I finally finished the book, I found myself thanking God that He didn't have Dekker and Peretti writing my life story. I imagine if they were in charge, I would have died in a car wreck a couple minutes before I cried out to Jesus that day I got saved.[/SPOILER]
"I wish I could prove I love you, but does that mean I have to walk on water?" - Hikaru Utada, Simple and Clean
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Postby Rogie » Sat May 13, 2006 3:02 pm

A little gravedigging, but I finally got around to reading this book (I've been reading a lot of Harry Potter). I started it Tuesday night and just finished it, Saturday afternoon. That's extremely fast for me, since I tend to read a book very slowly, concentrating on every word. I was reading this book so fast, I felt like I was skimming sentences just to keep going.

In that way, I love the book. Very few books manage to pull me in entirely like this one did. However, I was also looking and hoping for a huge twist ending (due to that guy's quote on the front cover: "a twist I never saw coming"). I didn't get that. And if this is the twist:

[SPOILER]That White was also an impostor of Lawdale[/SPOILER]

... then I saw that coming the entire time. Even when

[SPOILER]Lawdale suddenly showed up again near the end[/SPOILER]

... I kept telling myself, "I bet that's the big twist coming," while also hoping that it really wasn't. But there were no big surprises. Regardless, the book handled its themes very well, although I do agree that Leslie was handled incorrectly in the end. I think they did it to

[SPOILER]Keep Jack and Stephanie married in the end and their marriage saved. I find this totally bogus and not in line with the book. Plus, Stephanie's sudden change to a virtuous, unselfish character was unbelievable and too sudden.[/SPOILER]

The biggest disappointment with this book, however, are the typos. For one, they accidentally refer to Betty before Betty reveals her name to anyone. Also, they accidentally called Stewart by Randy's name once and did so in the present tense, almost as if it was a note in their outline of the book that was just cut and pasted into the prose. There was also a smaller typo later in the book. I find errors like this very irritating, especially since they're errors made about character names, not just typical typos.

Overall, this is definitely Peretti's worst book, and I see co-authoring it with Dekker as his biggest career mistake ever. The final advantage of this book is that it has sealed my decision to probably never read Dekker's books again. I consider him to be a weak writer with too many gimmicks and not enough payoff.

Man, I just trashed this book, huh? :sweat:
Zar wrote:Praise God for all things awesome. Life ROCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But sanctify the Lord your God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:
-- 1 Peter 3:15
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Postby Warrior 4 Jesus » Sat May 13, 2006 7:17 pm

Harsh, harsh. I found out (on the offical Dekker site) that the errors mentioned in House were only in the published version. The version that is printed and given to some people (advanced copies) were actually all correct in that regard. Bit strange.
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Postby Maledicte » Sat May 13, 2006 11:31 pm

Well, from looking at the dust jacket I know that Dekker came up with the villain's name.

Showdown's villain= Marsuvees Black
House's villain= Barsidious White

Who's next...Hullaballoo Red?
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Postby LittleShepherd » Sun May 14, 2006 6:01 am

SirThinks2Much wrote:Well, from looking at the dust jacket I know that Dekker came up with the villain's name.

Showdown's villain= Marsuvees Black
House's villain= Barsidious White

Who's next...Hullaballoo Red?

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Postby Maledicte » Sun May 14, 2006 10:43 pm

LittleShepherd wrote:Red Sterling

Ha, I can imagine the opening to THAT book.

"You unlock this door with the key of imagination. Beyond it is another dimension, a dimension of sound, a dimension of sight, a dimension of mind..."
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Postby Warrior 4 Jesus » Thu May 18, 2006 7:18 pm

Bought it two days ago and finished it last night.
I thought House was great! The only downsides to House for me were the occasional editing errors and grammatical errors (some sentences had to be read over a couple times).

It had the fast pacing of a Ted Dekker novel and Barsidious White (Showdown similarity), but for everything else I felt a huge influence of Frank Peretti. I really enjoyed it and while the concept was simple there was a lot to think about. I enjoyed this more than Showdown and found it a lot more disturbing and dark, and all the better for it. My assumption is that Susan wasn't an angel but the Holy Spirit.
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