Tag Archives: religion

Life of Pi by Yann Martel

Posted by melydia on March 26, 2006 None comments

Life of Pi by Yann Martel: From the cover art, this appears to be about a boy and a tiger in a boat. And it is, though it’s conspicuously lacking of seafaring felines for more than the first quarter of the book. Up to that point it talks mostly about Pi’s life as the son of a zookeeper in India and his quest to find religion (which he does – three of them, in fact). At times it’s a little preachy, others a little graphic, but all in all it’s a fairly believable tale about survival in a lifeboat. In a nutshell: Pi Patel’s family decides to move from India to Canada. They travel by cargo ship with many of the animals from their zoo which are now being shipped to other zoos around the world. The cargo ship sinks, leaving Pi stranded on a lifeboat with a few animals who escaped the ship. He spends 227 days on the ocean, his thoughts taken up by survival: how to get food, how to get fresh water, how to avoid being eaten by the 450-pound Bengal tiger that shares his lifeboat. It’s a classic man-versus-nature story, and if you enjoy movies like Castaway you will probably like this book as well.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman

Posted by melydia on January 12, 2006 None comments

Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett: The Apocalypse is nearing, but the Antichrist has been misplaced, and an angel and demon that have been around since Creation are realizing that they’re rather fond of the world and would prefer if it didn’t end just now. This is a funny book. The bizarre asides, reminiscent of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, are really the best part. I can see now why this book is so popular among fans of humorous fantasy: it’s wonderful. It’s one of the rare books I could see myself reading multiple times.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

The Dilbert Future by Scott Adams

Posted by melydia on April 16, 2005 None comments

The Dilbert Future by Scott Adams: Scott Adams is a cartoonist. He is not a stand-up comedian nor is he Dave Barry, though this book makes it quite clear that he really wants to be. Still, there is a reason he tells jokes in three-panel comic strips instead of 30-minute monologues. Here he addresses various aspects of life and makes tongue-in-cheek predictions, interspersed with Dilbert cartoons. It was obviously written in sections rather than as a whole, and the entire time all I could think about was how much more fitting these musings would be in somebody’s blog than a hardbound tome published by Harper Business, especially since so many of the predictions have gone out of date since its publication (such as his erroneous predictions for the futures of the cable modem and ISDN). There were some vaguely amusing parts but nothing was anywhere near laugh-out-loud funny, and I had to yawn a bit at the tired “women really rule the world” section – that idea was beaten to death decades ago and hasn’t gotten any funnier in the meantime. Frankly, the most humorous parts were the cartoons, and if I wanted to read those I could have just picked up a collection.

The final chapter, “A New View of the Future,” was inappropriate in this context. For this section Adams “turned the humor mode off” and discussed his personal philosophies. They were interesting but did not fit whatsoever with the rest of the book. His ideas on perception and cause and effect would also have been much more compelling had he bothered to actually research any of the theories and experiments he mentioned. I understand that the goal of this section was nothing more than to make the reader think about the universe a little differently, but it would have been much more effective had he spent an hour at the library finding a couple of references to cite. Saying things like “I’ll simplify the explanation, probably getting the details wrong in the process, but you’ll get the general idea” does not instill in me a desire to take him very seriously. That said, I am giving thought to trying out those affirmations.

Despite the incongruity of the chapter, I still enjoyed it about as much as I did the rest of the book, but for different reasons (the first part was vaguely amusing, the second vaguely intriguing). Ultimately this felt like a Dilbert collection trying to be a Dave Barry book. I think I’ll stick with the comic strips from now on.

Originally posted on BookCrossing.

Lamb by Christopher Moore

Posted by melydia on April 2, 2005 None comments

Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore: The title says it all. Levi who is called Biff is raised from the dead 2000 years later to share his account of the life of Jesus (who here is called Joshua), most notably the thirty years missing from the other Gospels. During this time Josh and Biff traveled to the East for 17 years, where they shared many adventures, and when they returned he began his ministry.

This book is pretty funny. Biff is a bit of an ass but a total joy to read. He claims to have invented all kinds of things, from sarcasm to pencils, and his witty but straightforward storytelling is a delight. But however irreverent this book may be, it remains true to the person of Jesus – his kindness, his generosity, his honesty. It also does not dance around his divinity: he was the Son of God and the Messiah, but not quite in the way the Jews expected. Biff’s devotion to him is understandable both as a faithful disciple and a lifelong friend.

For most of this book I thought I would be beginning my review with a hearty recommendation against it for any serious Christian. While I still don’t know if a Biblical literalist would enjoy this story, I think any Christian (or anyone else) with a fair sense of humor would get a big kick out of it. Moore’s epilogue, in which he describes his sources and sheds light on what could have been and what was sheer fiction, sums it up very well: “This story was not meant to challenge anyone’s faith; if one’s faith can be shaken by stories in a humorous novel, one may have a bit more praying to do.”

Originally posted on BookCrossing.

The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff

Posted by melydia on November 20, 2004 None comments

The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff: The timing of this read was intentional. Mired in the chaos of NaNoWriMo, I knew I would need something that was not only calming, but nonfiction. There are those who prefer to read fiction to inspire or comfort them while in the midst of a major writing project, but I knew that it would be distracting – I’d either get caught up in the storyline (and forget where I was going with mine) or the writing style would serve as a constant reminder of what tripe I was producing. A gentle philosophy book starring a Bear of Little Brain seemed to be just what I was looking for.

And in that respect, it was. However, I was not so impressed with the ideas presented in this book. It seemed to spend too much time explaining why Confucianism (which it consistently referred to as “Confusion”), Knowledge, and Cleverness were not the correct paths in life. I disagree; I believe that everything has its proper place. Perhaps we put too much emphasis on the latter two, but shunning them completely is not the answer. Things do not magically fall into place by doing Nothing all the time. Trust me, I’ve tried it. It’s relaxing, to be sure, until things start falling apart and suddenly you have to become a “Busy Backson” to catch up.

This was not a bad book, to be sure, and I am open to the possibility that I missed the point entirely. It was light and fun and in fact quite Clever. Its biggest benefit, however, was to instill in me a desire to read the A. A. Milne tales that inspired Hoff to write this book in the first place.

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