Review: Amsterdam 2012  - Thought Provoking Alternate Future Reality
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 05 28, 2010
Carefree and making their way across Europe, Peter and Anne meet a group of locals in Amsterdam willing to show them around to the various sites and galleries.  Finding their guides fun and engaging, they agree to accompany them to their home in the outskirts of town and enjoy dinner, desert, and new guests who arrive during their stay.  As the alcohol flows and the night drags on, Peter and Anne agree to spend the night in the Amsterdam couple's old windmill recently converted to a guest bedroom.  After a restful and relaxing sleep, the young couple make their way to their guests house to help clean up and start breakfast.  Inside, they find their hosts brutally slain bodies.  What follows is a harrowing escape from Europe that will not only change their lives, but the course of the world.In Amsterdam 2012, Ruth Fransisco paints what I would call an alternative reality of a potential future sequence of world events.  Similar to the assassination of Arch Duke Ferdinand which started World War I, Fransisco shows how these slayings in Amsterdam begin the start of World War III except this time, it is a war of Islam versus the rest of Europe and the United States.  I can understand the comments from some reviewers regarding the unlikely series of events or the speed upon with the Jihadists can take over so much of the world.  But this is why I call this an alternative reality.  Fransisco is hitting readers over the head with hyperbole of some of the potentially politically correct leanings of this country and how far it could take us if we aren't home watching the store.Do I think events could unfold as described?  No.  Do I think the book is thought provoking and compelling?  Absolutely.  Those who like a more subtle approach may not enjoy this read and would not find the United States to be so willing to embrace such radical cultural indoctrination.  Having said that, Clavell's bookThe Children's Storyfrightening shows how easily and quickly it is to change beliefs.  My estimate is this book will polarize readers but all will come away thinking.