Irish novelist Williams (Four Letters of Love, 1999, etc.) takes spiritual issues seriously—and continues to write...
John the Apostle, now a revered Master in exile with a small band of Christian brothers on the island of Patmos, confronts heresy, schism and doubt.
Infirm of body but strong of spirit, John lives in harsh conditions with a fragile company of believers. Together they await the return of Christ, but impatience and uncertainty create fissures that are beginning to split the group apart. The leading dissenter is Matthias, a cunning cynic who doubts the divinity of Christ and proclaims himself a “divine” being. His scheme involves orchestrating a performance in which he “miraculously” brings back to life a supposedly dead follower of the Master. Matthias begins to eerily echo the words of Christ: “I come to speak the truth. For it has been given to me. I am come a light into the world that whosoever believeth in me should not abide in darkness.” At this point the group splinters into the believers in Matthias and those who remain loyal to John. Meanwhile, an announcement reaches Patmos that the Emperor is dead, though shortly before his death he had issued a decree that the persecution of Christians should cease. Elated, John and his small circle of believers travel to Ephesus, where they discover that Christianity has become a fragile sect in danger of dying away. Those who seek favors from John want something tangible rather than the insubstantiality of a “mere” blessing. The true believers have their faith tested by being spurned and spat upon. As John’s hold on life keeps getting more tenuous, Matthias (whom John labels the “anti-Christ”) reappears to wreak yet more theological havoc. Ultimately, John, “in perfect clarity,” is graced with a vision of the end of time and dictates the divinely inspired words to an amanuensis.
Irish novelist Williams (Four Letters of Love, 1999, etc.) takes spiritual issues seriously—and continues to write compellingly about them.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-1-59691-467-4
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2007
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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