Frank Peretti's "The Oath" is a middleground book--not bad enough to trash, not good enough to praise. First a little background. There's a subgenre of horror, Christian horror, which is almost exactly like regular horror, except these stories tout some Christian ethic or belief or whatnot. Frank Peretti is one of the few writers of Christian horror I know of, and the only one I've read. In fact, "The Oath" is my first and, so far, only Christian horror novel.

The town of Hyde River is like a lot of fictional towns--close-knit and hiding an ancient secret. The book opens with Evelyn Benson fleeing the scene of her husband's murder. She's frantic, exhausted, and bloodied. Cliff's brother, wildlife biologist Steve Benson, comes to Hyde River to look into his brother's death, which is being blamed on a grizzly bear. Steve kills the bear, but soon new information suggests it wasn't a bear that killed Cliff after all. So what did?

A secret Cliff had been hiding from everyone, his wife and brother included, comes to light and things move from there. When another slaughter occurs, Steve's curiosity is piqued and the more he learns about the town of Hyde River, the less he believes what he's finding. And, to tell the truth, the less I believed it, too. Indescribable monsters I can buy, but what Peretti has as his antagonist in this book made me stop for a second, shake my head, and say, "Whatever, man."

Initially I thought the premise would be that this small town was so wrapped up in its religious beliefs that any sinner in the town was killed by a, if not THE, Devil, which lived in the woods and mountains surrounding the area. Unfortunately, this was not the case.

When Steve finally faces the . . . let's call it The Villain, he wonders how can he ever hope to defeat such a thing. Enter Levi Cobb, town lunatic, who gives Steve the secret. "When the [villain] sees Jesus in you, he'll back up. He will. You can fool him into backing up."

What?

"You submit to God and get clean of your sin, that ol' [villain]'ll be a pussycat. You'll put him down real easy."

Seriously?

"You gotta get right with God, Steve."

Well if that's all it takes, what's the problem?

Up to this point, I was making my way through the book, reading and just going along with Steve Benson. But from here, I had to wonder what Peretti was thinking. I understood he made his protagonist a scientist so he could play off that rational mind to create tension in a situation where faith, not science, is required. But I remember the day, the very second, I felt God come into my life, and, well, when Steve kneels in the church, we read this: "Lord God . . . as You know, I am not a religious person. I've seldom if ever entered a church. But I'm a believer now. I believe what Levi said. I'm willing to accept Your existence and the rightness of Your commandments, Your truth, the Ten Commandments, and whatever else there is."

Sure you are, I thought, because it's the only thing that'll get you out of this. Now, I don't know about other Christians, but when it happened to me, it wasn't because I was in a bind and I saw turning to God as my last resort. It just happened. I'd been mulling over my life and my very new interest in reading the Bible and suddenly, there it was, clear as anything, the touch of God like an awakening in my heart and head.

But from Peratti, we get, on page 535:

Then Steve recalled Levi's words: "When the [villain] sees Jesus in you, he'll back up. You'll scare him . . ."

But is Jesus in me?

. . .

"Jesus . . ." Steve prayed as he turned to face the [villain] head-on. "Please be in me."

And believing Steve Benson had suddenly found God and wanted to redeem himself of his sins was like believing Nicole Kidman was actually in love with Ewan McGregor in Moulin Rouge. I wasn't buying it.

But this wasn't even my biggest problem with "The Oath." The book is 550 pages long. You know why? Excerpt from page 341:

A shadow, just a shadow, with nothing there to cast it.

Then, from page 344:

Possibly, just possibly, there's been some digging under the cliff and he was seeing the waste. It could be just another mine, and yet . . .

Possibly, just possibly, he'd found the creature's den.

And a few paragraphs later, same page:

It could be the mouth of a cave.

He edged closer.

He'd come to the mouth of a cave.

How much smaller would this book have been with a good editing, a heartless cutting of words and phrases that Peretti repeats and repeats and repeats? A LOT smaller, I'm telling you.

However.

Don't think I didn't enjoy something about this book.

As I said, the town of Hyde River is a tight-knit community and what I admired most in this book was how Peretti brought all that down at the end.

Remember in "'salem's Lot" how Stephen King introduced a town full of characters and all of a sudden by the end of the book they're all vampires and the town is GONE? That's what this was like. All of a sudden, the entire town is infected with the villain's mark and the ensuing riot nearly destroys the place. Beautifully done. Unfortunately, in this case, it was just a bunch of names and bodies, because Peretti introduced us to his characters from the outside, instead of letting us into their homes and lives for a few pages like King did.

And when he's writing the action scenes, I think that's when Peretti is at his best. He certainly knows how to move the scene along with his verbs.

So, in the end, if you can overlook the sheer unbelievability of the villain, and if you don't mind reading the same phrases a few times in a row on a single page, sure, go ahead, give "The Oath" a read.

Recommended: Yes