An original religious plot buoyed by philosophical depth.
After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, a woman leaves her family to follow a man she believes is Jesus.
In this novel, Catherine Deare lives a happy but ordinary life in a suburb of Pennsylvania. Contentedly married and the mother of a well-adjusted teenager, she works as an entertainer at children’s birthday parties (she studied music in college). Then one day that begins like any other, she picks up a hitchhiker who says he’s headed to Philadelphia who’s preternaturally intuitive and generally mysterious, with just a hint of the kind of religious zeal that usually discomfits her. Before he departs, he inexplicably guesses that Catherine suffers from the loss of a child—she did, in fact, lose her daughter, Lindsey, in a freak accident some 10 years earlier. She is convinced she just met Jesus, and at the very least he looks the part: tall and slender, with a mane of long hair and a face blanketed with a full beard. Later that same day, Catherine discovers that the World Trade Center was attacked and the grim news slowly trickles in from friends, family, and television reports. The nation as a whole reacts to the catastrophe with a blend of implacable bloodlust and ostentatious displays of patriotism, which makes Catherine profoundly uncomfortable, a collective response powerfully captured by Colahan (Career School, 2015). Even Catherine’s husband, Brian, an otherwise reasonable man, is overcome by a “thirst for vengeance.” Then, emotionally roiled by stress and her family’s insistence that she enlist the help of a therapist, Catherine runs into that stranger yet again, who takes her to meet his group of disciples, who refer to him as “Lord” and “Master.” He confirms her suspicions that he is Jesus, and Catherine abandons her family to join his quest to return to Bethlehem. Colahan builds an emotionally arresting drama around a refreshingly unconventional premise. And Jesus’ band of disciples is an intriguingly eclectic bunch, including a prostitute and a fugitive serial rapist. Jesus remains an enigmatic character even after he affirms his identity—he seems remarkably ordinary in some respects for a divine personage, and his refusal to present an unambiguous demonstration of his power through the performance of miracles frustrates his followers to no end. Still, there’s something nebulously masterly about him, a kind of supernatural spirituality that makes his preposterous claim plausible. The conceit of the novel produces some philosophically searching discussions about the nature of Christianity and moral judgment, the character of evil and sin, and topical issues like the death penalty. Colahan also raises a provocative question: If Jesus were to actually walk the Earth today, what would be his purpose? Jesus answers this obliquely: “Catherine, believe it or not, saving the world from its problems has never been my mission. That’s like expecting a marriage counselor to save every marriage. The counselor shows the troubled couple the route they should go, but they still have to take the journey themselves or the marriage will fail.”
An original religious plot buoyed by philosophical depth.Pub Date: May 8, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-945330-90-2
Page Count: 391
Publisher: Telemachus Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 4, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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