A thoughtful, well-written sampling of religious uncertainty.
Newhall explores the porous boundary between skepticism and belief in this debut work of nonfiction.
In a time when religious people and atheists both seem to be taking a harder line, Newhall considers those whose spiritual leanings fall somewhere between faith and doubt; a category into which she herself fits. After a childhood of strong belief, she found, in adulthood, much more reason to question God’s existence: “Every once in a while…I’ll feel God’s presence. And for a breathless moment, I’ll remember and think, yes, God is here. Of course God is here. How could it be otherwise? But that is only some of the time. Most of the time I have lived with the otherwise.” She tells the stories of similar people she’s met: a Catholic who left the religion of his childhood for Buddhism; an atheist who attempts to prove God’s existence by asking that he lift a pea; a Muslim musician who is distraught by the changing face of Islam; a Congregationalist minister who questions her faith after losing a pregnancy. The book contains representatives of many traditions: Evangelicalism, Mormonism, Hinduism, the religion of the Miwok of California. Most end up erring on the side of belief, yes, but only after periods of uncertainty. Told with the practiced rhythms of a longtime storyteller (Newhall has been a staff writer at a number of newspapers), the prose is crisp and accessible. The accounts of her subjects are told in the first person, which lends a bit of intimacy to their experiences. The book will likely find its readership among those people who see themselves reflected in its pages—those who have been looking for but not finding God. It succeeds in its reminder that while religious certainty may be an ideal, it’s far from the norm: most are unsure of what powers might exist at the other end of death or prayer or enlightenment. Readers are unlikely to come away feeling closer to any cosmic truths, but they may feel a bit less alone.
A thoughtful, well-written sampling of religious uncertainty.Pub Date: Feb. 19, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-939221-25-4
Page Count: 270
Publisher: Patheos Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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