A well-intentioned parable, full of big ideas but short on emotional intensity.
An exploration of reincarnation and spiritual growth, written by a mother and father who claim to be channeling their deceased son’s words.
After Ricardo K. Petrillo’s death in 2005, his parents came to believe that they could receive messages from him, via “automatic writing” through his father. Petrillo and Knoploch have since published five collections (Planet Janus, 2011, etc.) of such writing, and whether readers appreciate this sixth entry will largely depend on whether they’re onboard with the authors’ premise. This book comes with an additional source of confusion: Its fictional main characters are actually two different incarnations of one individual. Elderly Julius attempts to explore his past lives, and so we meet Daniel, a young spiritual seeker during the French Revolution. Through a series of political and personal travails, Daniel comes to understand the consequences of individual actions and emotions, and he strives to help those around him achieve a similar level of spiritual serenity. In one of the many authors’ comments sprinkled throughout the book, the reader is told: “Ah, if only men and women could understand how these emotions affect their lives….If they could open themselves to those that care and are just expecting an opportunity to help, they would change the world.” Sincere, didactic and deeply Christian, the narrative circles around and around these themes of eternal love and personal responsibility, and Daniel’s various dilemmas are likely to engage the spiritually curious. Daniel himself, however, remains frustratingly vague. He achieves a state of preternatural calm and detachment, but it’s never quite clear how he does so, and his near-angelic characterization makes it hard to relate his life to that of the everyday. The language can be distracting as well; it’s often florid, as when Daniel is introduced with these words: “Youth! What a marvelous time of life in which energy and vitality abound to support the thoughts of a mind thirsty for knowledge and ideals.” Hindered by trite phrasing and underdeveloped characters, the story ultimately lacks immediacy.
A well-intentioned parable, full of big ideas but short on emotional intensity.Pub Date: March 17, 2013
ISBN: 978-1470071684
Page Count: 132
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: May 29, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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In this highly learned yet accessible book, Robinson offers believers fresh insight into a well-studied text.
A deeply thoughtful exploration of the first book of the Bible.
In this illuminating work of biblical analysis, Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist Robinson, whose Gilead series contains a variety of Christian themes, takes readers on a dedicated layperson’s journey through the Book of Genesis. The author meanders delightfully through the text, ruminating on one tale after another while searching for themes and mining for universal truths. Robinson approaches Genesis with a reverence and level of faith uncommon to modern mainstream writers, yet she’s also equipped with the appropriate tools for cogent criticism. Throughout this luminous exegesis, which will appeal to all practicing Christians, the author discusses overarching themes in Genesis. First is the benevolence of God. Robinson points out that “to say that God is the good creator of a good creation” sets the God of Genesis in opposition to the gods of other ancient creation stories, who range from indifferent to evil. This goodness carries through the entirety of Genesis, demonstrated through grace. “Grace tempers judgment,” writes the author, noting that despite well-deserved instances of wrath or punishment, God relents time after time. Another overarching theme is the interplay between God’s providence and humanity’s independence. Across the Book of Genesis, otherwise ordinary people make decisions that will affect the future in significant ways, yet events are consistently steered by God’s omnipotence. For instance, Joseph is sold into slavery by his brothers, and that action has reverberated throughout the history of all Jewish people. Robinson indirectly asks readers to consider where the line is between the actions of God and the actions of creation. “He chose to let us be,” she concludes, “to let time yield what it will—within the vast latitude granted by providence.”
In this highly learned yet accessible book, Robinson offers believers fresh insight into a well-studied text.Pub Date: March 12, 2024
ISBN: 9780374299408
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2023
If the authors are serious, this is a silly, distasteful book. If they are not, it’s a brilliant satire.
The authors have created a sort of anti-Book of Virtues in this encyclopedic compendium of the ways and means of power.
Everyone wants power and everyone is in a constant duplicitous game to gain more power at the expense of others, according to Greene, a screenwriter and former editor at Esquire (Elffers, a book packager, designed the volume, with its attractive marginalia). We live today as courtiers once did in royal courts: we must appear civil while attempting to crush all those around us. This power game can be played well or poorly, and in these 48 laws culled from the history and wisdom of the world’s greatest power players are the rules that must be followed to win. These laws boil down to being as ruthless, selfish, manipulative, and deceitful as possible. Each law, however, gets its own chapter: “Conceal Your Intentions,” “Always Say Less Than Necessary,” “Pose as a Friend, Work as a Spy,” and so on. Each chapter is conveniently broken down into sections on what happened to those who transgressed or observed the particular law, the key elements in this law, and ways to defensively reverse this law when it’s used against you. Quotations in the margins amplify the lesson being taught. While compelling in the way an auto accident might be, the book is simply nonsense. Rules often contradict each other. We are told, for instance, to “be conspicuous at all cost,” then told to “behave like others.” More seriously, Greene never really defines “power,” and he merely asserts, rather than offers evidence for, the Hobbesian world of all against all in which he insists we live. The world may be like this at times, but often it isn’t. To ask why this is so would be a far more useful project.
If the authors are serious, this is a silly, distasteful book. If they are not, it’s a brilliant satire.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-670-88146-5
Page Count: 430
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1998
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