The Passage by Justin Cronin

I tell my students, "If you can't write what you're supposed to, write what you can. It will get your brain and fingers talking to each other, and soon enough, you'll be ready to write what you're supposed to. Write anything. Write about how you can't think of anything to write. Write about how much you loathe my class. Just write, and the rest will come."

That's what I'm doing today by posting on Justin Cronin's The Passage, instead of writing stuff I'm supposed to be working on for Steampunk Scholar. The Passage was my first non-steampunk read in a very long time: when I moved into my office at Grant MacEwan University in early July, I vowed that I'd get back to leisure reading. The Passage was my commute audiobook, and it was a delight. I enjoyed it for its length, literary aspect, long-lived leeches, and lack of linearity. How's that for an alliterative reflection?

Length: This book is epic. It's 36 hours of listening, as opposed to the average of 10-12 hours most audiobooks take. I didn't mind though, as I was in the mood for something long-winded. Some reviews have derided the book for "too much detail," which is a criticism that's begun to bother me. It's like a review of a film which states that "nothing happens." Something always happens, but for addicts of  bombastic-blockbusters and fast-paced page-turners, books like The Passage move too slowly. If that's you, then I recommend approaching The Passage as two books: pre-apocalypse, and post-apocalypse. Or try the abridged audio version from audible. com. For those who enjoy developed characters, and well-wrought, detail-oriented stories, this is the book for you.

Literary: The pre-apocalypse section read like three or four different books. If you removed the viral-vampire-experimentation aspect, the individual stories of each character could have been written as straight fiction, and been quite good. Cronin weaves these tales together masterfully, albeit with a number of what  seem like coincidences. I say "seem," because there's an element of some spiritual power at work in the greater arc of the novel, some force of providence which lends the heroes a helping hand. That isn't to say it's all light and fluffy: Cronin gives the reader plenty to avert their gaze to: favorite characters die, are abused, come to the brink of despair, and you're never quite sure if the outcome is going to be grim or hopeful. This ties in to Cronin's theme of life and death, and the title's reference, both to an actual passage and more frequently, to the passage from life into death. Some detractors have stated this book has no literary value, but I'm guessing their definition of literary means A.S. Byatt, or something involving infidelity and a depressing ending. Cronin is 21st century-literary: literary in the sense that "text" no longer refers only to written text, but visual text as well. Cronin uses smart pop references to the X-Men's Wolverine to convey what is happening to the men undergoing testing, or a small detail of the Powerpuff Girls on a backpack as foreshadowing.

Long-lived Leeches: If you didn't know the book was about vampires, then you haven't read the blurb, or any of the reviews. Cronin's vampires are a great mix of classic bloodsucker along with new iterations. This too is part of the books literary lineage, referencing or paying homage to a number of vampire texts. Again, one can't view this as literary as book. When Cronin references Dracula, it isn't via Stoker, but rather Browning and Lugosi, arguably the most famous, albeit innacurate, representation of Dracula. Cronin provides nods to this classic vampire--the monsters of The Passage glow, but don't sparkle, and would eat the cast of Twilight for breakfast. Neither are they the well-dressed, mannered, androgynous killers of Anne Rice: these share a heritage with the vampires of Matheson's I Am Legend, monsters born of an apocalypse. Like the zombie apocalypse of Romero and more recently, World  War Z, the appetite of these vampires is to consume the planet, leaving it in a state that recalls The Road Warrior as much as it does Stephen King's The Stand.

Lack of linearity: Any one of these aforementioned elements could make for a good read, but what makes The Passage a worthy addition to your late-summer reading list is how Cronin plays with time. Like all good writers, Cronin utilizes one character at a time to focalize the action, at times employing epistolary diary excerpts (which recalls Stoker's Dracula), so that entire events unfold without all the details being revealed. The Passage is revealed one perspective at a time, leaving the reader in suspense as to certain outcomes, especially the fate of characters who are "off camera." At times, he shifts away from one action piece to return to a more mundane aspect of the story. In a lesser writer's hand, this would be infuriating. In Cronin's, it's expert cliffhanging and dynamic play, rising to a fever pitch and then returning to a slower, gentler pace before racing back into the fray.

I loved the people I met along the journey of The Passage; so much so that when I ran out of a part of the audiobook one commute, I gave a despairing moan. Cronin writes languorously enough to draw the reader repeatedly into the circle of characters before threatening them with the terrors of this bleak future. Despite death being always just around the corner though, the reader need not fear the carpet being pulled out from under their feet - while death is a major theme, so is hope. Given its considerable length, you might be surprised to find out  The Passage is only the first in a series, but if you're like me, when you turn the last page, flip the last screen, or hear the final words, you'll be wishing for another 766 pages, or 36 hours. It's been a long time since I've been looking forward to "the next installment," and I'm glad to finally be doing so. 

Check out the official site of The Passage with some creepy videos and immersive elements from the post-apocalyptic world of the Virals.

Lent 03: The Book of the Shepherd

I recently received The Book of the Shepherd by "The Scribe" as part of my participation in the Ooze's Viral Bloggers, so I'm going to make my review of it my Lenten confession of the day.

Given that it's likely scribes who were responsible for editing disparate oral traditions into the various cogent scriptures the major religions of the world currently adhere to, it's appropriate that The Book of the Shepherd has only "the Scribe" listed as its author (though a quick perusal of the copyright information will give you the author's real name). Imagine that someone saw it as their scholarly duty to take all those pithy emails you receive about peace, or love, or spirituality, the ones that often come with a Power Point presentation set to music, and felt that there was  need to amalgamate these into a single, coherent narrative. Now imagine that after they're done, due to the way in which the Internet acts as a disseminator of modern folklore, this book is well received as a book of spiritual guidance. Imagine they've packaged it in a nice little hardback with a cover graphic that makes the slipcase look like vintage leather binding, already letting the reader know that this book contains ancient wisdom (which in this era, email forwards from five years ago are). Imagine this, and you've imagined The Book of the Shepherd.

I like fables. I like parables. I love allegory. None of these are easy to write, contrary to popular opinion. The majority of short didactic narratives are either excessively heavy-handed or cloyingly sentimental. The Book of the Shepherd is the second. It's the result of a trickle-down from the pop-spirituality of the 80s and 90s into the mass-email forwards of the early twentieth century, made into one little book that feels old world, but is so ultimately new world that it fails at having the sort of authority other texts like it do.

Parables and fables work well when they're short. As either of these, The Book of the Shepherd fails by going on too long, giving too much character information. It starts to approach being a modern work of fiction, but because it's trying to hard to be didactic and teach us something, it never achieves the believability or relatability of character modern fiction requires. And we can't call it allegory, because the characters aren't symbolic in the way allegories demand. So I'm not sure what it is. What I do know is that I can't recommend it, for the same reason I wouldn't recommend The Celestine Prophecy.

When I was a minister, I was supposed to tell people to avoid reading The Celestine Prophecy because it was New Age. But that wasn't the reason I'd tell you to avoid reading it. I'd tell you to avoid reading The Celestine Prophecy for the same reason I'd tell you to avoid reading Left Behind or Atlas Shrugged: they're poorly written works of didactic fiction. The Book of the Shepherd is another. Most of the time, when an author tries to hard to tell me how to live, he sacrifices his chance to tell me a decent story in the process. There are exceptions to this, but they are few and far between.

Writers risk us missing their point when they work towards the sort of moral complexity and ambiguity a good story demands. The more simplified the moral strata, the less I can buy in. Lewis' The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe remains one of the best allegorical pieces of fiction because you can miss the Christian message. It can be appreciated simply as a great piece of children's fiction. I don't have to "get" something out of it to enjoy it. Writing like The Book of the Shepherd is only worth reading if I think it holds the keys to my spiritual well-being. Since its mostly just a collection of bumper-sticker spirituality, I'd recommend anyone interested in this sort of spiritual path to Google Scott Peck or Thomas Moore, read the wikipedia articles on them, and save yourself the bucks. 

I would like to add as a postscript that anyone referring to this book as a fairy tale has no clue what a fairy tale is. I will also recommend a few of my favorite allegories, parables, and fables that have a strong spiritual aspect to them:

The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis
"The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" by Ursula K. Le Guin
"Barrington Bunny" from The Way of the Wolf: The Gospel in New Images by Martin Bell
The Singer by Calvin Miller


On the subject of spiritual reading, I'll close by posting one of my favorite writings The Book of the Shepherd wishes it was in the tradition of: Walter Wangerin's "The Ragman":

I saw a strange sight. I stumbled upon a story most strange, like nothing in my life, my street sense, my sly tongue had ever prepared me for.
    Hush, child. hush now, and I will tell it to you.
Even before the dawn one Friday morning I noticed a young man, handsome and strong, walking the alleys of our City. He was pulling an old cart filled with clothes both bright and new, and he was calling in a clear tenor voice: "Rags!" Ah, the air was foul and the first light filthy to be crossed by such sweet music.
    "Rags! New rags for old! I take your tired rags! Rags!"
"Now this is a wonder," I thought to myself, for the man stood six-feet-four, and his arms were like tree limbs, hard and muscular, and his eyes flashed intelligence. Could he find no better job than this, to be a ragman in the inner city?
    I followed him. My curiosity drove me. And I wasn't disappointed.
Soon the ragman saw a woman sitting on her back porch. She was sobbing into a handkerchief, sighing, and shedding a thousand tears. Her knees and elbows made a sad X. Her shoulders shook. Her heart was breaking.
    The Ragman stopped his cart. Quietly, he walked to the woman, stepping round tin cans, dead toys, and Pampers.
   "Give me your rag," he said gently. "and I'll give you another."
He slipped the handkerchief from her eyes. She looked up, and he laid across her palm a linen cloth so clean and new that it shined. She blinked from the gift to the giver.
    Then, as he began to pull his cart again, the Ragman did a strange thing: he put her stained handkerchief to his own face; and then he began to weep, to sob as grievously as she had done, his shoulders shaking. Yet she was left without a tear.
    "This is a wonder," I breathed to myself, and I followed the sobbing Ragman like a child who cannot turn away from mystery.
    "Rags! Rags! New Rags for old!"
    In a little while, when the sky showed gray behind the rooftops and I could see the shredded curtains hanging out black windows, the Ragman came upon a girl whose head was wrapped in a bandage, whose eyes were empty. Blood soaked her bandage. A single line of blood ran down her cheek.
   Now the tall Ragman looked upon this child with pity, and he drew a lovely yellow bonnet from his cart.
    "Give me your rag," he said, tracing his own line on her cheek, "and I'll give you mine."
    The child could only gaze at him while he loosened the bandage, removed it, and tied it to his own head. The bonnet he set on hers. And I gasped at what I saw: for with the bandage went the wound! Against his brow it ran a darker, more substantial blood -- his own!
    "Rags! Rags! I take old rags!" cried the sobbing, bleeding, strong, intelligent Ragman.
    The sun hurt both the sky, now, and my eyes; the Ragman seemed more and more to hurry.
    "Are you going to work?" he asked a man who leaned against a telephone pole. The man shook his head. The Ragman pressed him: "Do you have a job?"
    "Are you crazy?" sneered the other. He pulled away from the pole, revealing the right sleeve of his jacket -- flat, the cuff stuffed into the pocket. He had no arm.
    "So," said the Ragman. "Give me your jacket, and I'll give you mine."
    So much quiet authority in his voice!
    The one-armed man took off his jacket. So did the Ragman -- and I trembled at what I saw: for the Ragman's arm stayed in its sleeve, and when the other put it on, he had two good arms, thick as tree limbs; but the Ragman had only one.
    "Go to work," he said.
    After that he found a drunk, lying unconscious beneath an army blanket, an old man, hunched, wizened, and sick. He took that blanket and wrapped it round himself, but for the drunk he left new clothes.
    And now I had to run to keep up with the Ragman. Though he was weeping uncontrollably, and bleeding freely at the forehead, pulling his cart with one arm, stumbling for drunkenness, falling again and again, exhausted, old, old, and sick, yet he went with terrible speed. On spider's legs he skittered through the alleys of the City, this mile and the next, until he came to its limits, and then he rushed beyond.
    I wept to see the change in this man. I hurt to see his sorrow. And yet I needed to see where he was going in such haste, perhaps to know what drove him so.
    The little old Ragman -- he came to a landfill. He came to the garbage pits. And I waited to help him in what he did --but I hung back, hiding. He climbed a hill. With tormented labor he cleared a little space on that hill. Then he sighed. He lay down. He pillowed his head on a handkerchief and a jacket. He covered his bones with an army blanket. And he died.
    Oh, how I cried to witness that death! I slumped in a junked car and wailed and mourned as one who has no hope--because I had come to love the Ragman. Every other face had faded in the wonder of this man, and I cherished him; but he died. I sobbed myself to sleep.
    I did not know--how could I know? -- that I slept through Friday and Saturday and its night too.
    But then, on Sunday morning, I was wakened by a violence.
    Light--pure, hard, demanding light--slammed against my sour face, and I blinked, and I looked, and I saw the first wonder of all. There was the Ragman, folding the blanket most carefully, a scar on his forehead, but alive! And, besides that, healthy! There was no sign of sorrow or age, and all the rags that he had gathered shined for cleanliness.
    Well, then I lowered my head and, trembling for all that I had seen, I myself walked up to the Ragman. I told him my name with shame, for I was a sorry figure next to him. Then I took off all my clothes in that place, and I said to him with dear yearning in my voice: "Dress me."
    He dressed me. My Lord, he put new rags on me, and I am a wonder beside him.
    The Ragman, the Ragman, the Christ!

An apocalyptic Advent

Today is the first day of Advent 2009. In the wake of the end of the Gathering, I've spent over a year without a liturgical calendar, without the flow and rhythm that characterized my religious life for seven years. As Advent approached this year, I saw it as an opportunity to begin my own liturgical practice again. At the Gathering, we called Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany "Incarnation Season". For Incarnation Seasons past, I read through Walter Wangerin's excellent Preparing for Jesus: Meditations on the coming of Christ, Advent, Christmas, and the Kingdom, and more recently Phylis Tickles' Christmastide: Prayers for Advent through Epiphany from The Divine Hours. both as devotional texts. I find the majority of Christmas devotions to be sentimental in the worst way possible, treating the holiday season with a sentimental reverence akin to Ricky Bobby's "baby Jesus" prayer in Talladega Nights.

But this year, neither Wangerin or Tickle seemed quite right. As I put up our tree last night (yes, I know, many of you don't put your Christmas tree up until Christmas - we put ours up after Gunnar's birthday on November 25, like Americans who do it after Thanksgiving but before the first week of December), I was listening to The Cellist of Sarajevo by Steven Galloway, a book I am teaching next semester. As a spiritually minded man in his early 20s who was often little earthly good, I had largely ignored the events in Sarajevo for theological musings. My ignorance of that conflict forced me to google the siege of Sarajevo as context for my reading. What many of you likely already knew was fresh news to me. I found myself thinking about Trans-Siberian Orchestra's "Christmas Eve/Sarajevo 12/24", a Metallica-esque take on "Carol of the Bells", in an entirely new light.

Add to this the prominence of articles in the news on the end of the world, inspired by the release of the film version of Cormac McCarthy's The Road this weekend. Compound that with my contextualizing of the apocalyptic tension of the Cold War to my students as we study James Cameron's The Abyss; an episode of Boston Legal I'll be teaching to my Analysis and Argument students this week where Nantucket requests the right to build an atomic bomb, not because they really want one, but because no one talks about nuclear threat any more; the relentless dystopia of Battlestar Galactica Season Four; the Edmonton Journal's report on the potential genocide of the world's bat populations, which echoed the H1N1 scare, and got me thinking about the bleak future of Paolo Bacigalupi's calorie-starved world in The Windup Girl. I needed a different meditation for Advent, for Incarnation this year.

Traditionally, Advent is to meditate upon the coming of Christ, either the Nativity of the past, or the Parousia of the future. I chose to go with the latter this year. So this morning over breakfast, I read the preface to Harry O. Maier's Apocalypse Recalled: The Book of Revelation after Christendom. I really enjoyed reading the first chapters of this book, which I picked up at the King's University College bookstore the year before I worked there. I have found I can always count on the King's bookstore for theology that provides me with an edge to grow against. I've never finished the book, but I intend to use it daily this Incarnation season, to temper the apocalyptic tone of my world at the end of 2009.

Maier's basic contention is that Revelation should not be read as "a book to map out an ending to history" (with which I agree completely as a preterist-symbolist), nor only as a "means to comfort churches suffering religious persecution under the Roman Empire" (which is a divergence from the more traditional reading of John's apocalypse), but as a call for Christians to incarnate a "world-ending discipleship." What Maier means by this is more Blood Diamond than it is 2012:

"That is to say, the book [of Revelation] urges Christians to live out an ending to greed and selfishness and to discover a new vision of civic identity centered in the religious particularity of the Christian story, one that interrupts and renounces the forms of violence, greed, and despair that lessen us as human beings...In that sense the book urges an eschatological commitment - a commitment to living endings." (xi, italics mine)

In a terribly complex global community, in a world where the future doesn't look so bright, Christians must do more than just promise that God will someday come to tidy up, or potentially just reduce, reuse, and recycle this broken Creation. We must act in the present to bring the Kingdom, on earth as it is in heaven. Not as a merging of church and state, but in a "counterimperial identity in faithfulness to Jesus Christ." I hesitate even here, knowing how badly such words can be interepreted. I am not advocating for the sign wavers and the political dissidents, for those who lobby for gun-rights and rail against Obama's new health care imperatives. I am advocating for a Christianity that reflects critically "on Christian discipleship in the face of forms of imperial domination, whether they be those of Pax Romana, or of the Pax Americana". And even as I say that, I must remind myself of the freedom I have to publish these words without fear or reprisal. I am not anti-American, or anti-democracy: I am pro-incarnating. Incarnating Jesus into the current society. Tony Campolo has suggested that the ruling society of the day is always Babylon, always in need of critique and careful consideration.

At the very least, I am definitely railing against only comfortably contemplating the Christ child in a sentimental, romanticized fashion, or anticipating the apocalypse with a rabid fervor that echoes the cultic madmen of Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos. In Maier's words, "an otherworldly reading of John's Apocalypse is a fundamental misreading of Revelation."

"Preoccupied with a call to faithful witness, Revelation offers a portrait of this-worldly discipleship and Christian commitment. If it leaves the future to God, it invites consideration of a present filled with the sounds of faithful testimony to its counterimperial hero, Jesus." (xiii)

If the second advent is a message of hope and not hellfire, one that isn't waiting for the end of time, but the beginning of the Kingdom, then I think more people would echo my prayer today from Revelation 22: Even so, come Lord Jesus.

A People's History of Christianity

In addition to the misuse of apostrophes, I am annoyed by statements to the effect that "religion is responsible for more killings than anything else," or "religious people are nothing but sheep" or other vague, uninformed blanket statements. On the other hand, I find it equally frustrating to hear Protestants talk as though God was letting the Church coast into the depths of heresy for nearly 1600 years before Martin Luther and John Calvin came along and gave Catholicism an enema. Having been part of a "hipper-than-thou" congregation, I've also learned the folly of implying that one has "found the way to do church" like no one ever has before.

For all of these people, I recommend Diana Butler Bass's A People's History of Christianity.

Divided into five parts, the book highlights a number of grassroots moments in the history of the church, showing how Christians of each major period in Church history were trying to make sense of their faith. Each part is further subdivided into a repeating trinity: first, presenting the title "Christianity as..." followed by "A Way of Life," "Spiritual Architecture," "Living Words," "A Quest for Truth," and finally, "Navigation"; second, a meditation on how each period showed devotion to Christ based on their understanding of their faith, and third, how this affected Christian ethics of the time.

Butler-Bass begins by differentiating the history she is telling from other Christian histories by creating a difference between militant Christianity and generative Christianity:

"Whereas militant Christianity triumphs over all, generative Christianity transforms the world through humble service to all. It is not about victory; it is about following Christ in order to seed human community with grace." (11)

As anyone who frequents my blog will know, I dislike unfair polarizations such as spirituality vs. religion, which posits one as good, and the other bad, without being aware that from a sociological perspective, spirituality is religious - a better polemic would be organized religion vs. organic religion, or something like that. So I appreciate that Butler-Bass creates a fair polemic to base her argument upon.

Butler-Bass situates her history as the story behind emergent Christianity, which strikes me as a necessity, given that antagonists of emergent movements have rightly supposed the roots of emergent Christianity to be in medieval Christianity: while this is clearly a negative to the conservative detractors of emergent Christianity, Butler-Bass provides emergent adherents with a history, a story to contradict the perception that emergent churches are doing something solely hip and new. Movements without histories and traditions can find themselves adrift. Butler-Bass provides a basis for the tradition Leonard Sweet called the "anchor" of the church in Aqua Church: "What progressive Christianity needs to understand is that "emerging" Christianity has a story. Their faith is not new; the generative faith of Great Command Christianity is a reemerging tradition that has always been the beating heart of Christian history" (12).

Yet I think A People's History of Christianity is a book for all branches of Christianity, at least those who can stand some real ecumenism, not simply gestures towards it. What occurred to me in my reading was how necessary the reminder of how diverse the church is, and that this diversity is not wrong; an apostate church requires reformation, not rejection. It requires revolution, but not removal. The curse of the Protestant movement is that it has encouraged believers to reject their current church experience, remove themselves from it, and then begin to reform. The blessing of this, if we can find a way to reconciliation (which I am increasingly more cynical of with each passing year) we can exist in the beauty of this diversity.

A People's History chronicles how, over the history of the church, there have been diverse grass roots movements: some break off from the institutional church and start anew, some stay inside and seek to reform from within. We are reminded that there have been numerous forms of Christianity over the past 2000 years, and those movements, those eras, cannot be dismissed or applauded as unilaterally bad or good. In her section on the Middle Ages, Butler-Bass concedes the fact that few contemporary Christians draw analogies with the church of the Middle Ages, stating that it is "fashionable in some circles to deride the medieval church as part of "Christendom," a political arrangement that joined church and state in a hierarchy of power that compromised vital faith." And yet, she notes, there is renewed interest in certain aspects of Medieval Christianity, and while she admits the errors of the day, she also shows the side of medieval Christianity few history texts focus on, and relates the medieval people's need for visual texts to teach them the narrative of their faith. They had stained glass, we have video screens. Admirably, she doesn't reduce this comparison naively, supposing that we're just like the early Christians. Butler-Bass is a serious historian. Her goal is not to encourage nostalgia on the part of her readers, but to show how what is new has a precedent. After all, isn't it encouraging to find that the church has done what we are doing before, and that it spoke to the church in a similar way to how we see it speaking to congregations today?

If you are a student of church history, either amateur or professional, there will likely be familiar content here, but in addition to these well-known moments, such as the Protestant Reformation, there are many surprises: a town in Spain where Judaism, Islam, and Christianity coexisted peacefully; Harry Emerson Fosdick's idea that "faith made evolution make sense" (270); and the historical precedent for how "dispensationalism is not the only version of the Christian apocalyptic" which she sees as "essentially a hopeless vision of a hostile universe" (128). It is a delightfully accessible book which never stoops to dumbing down. It is like sitting in on a great lecture on Church history. If I'm ever at the Cathedral College of the Washington National Cathedral when Diana Butler Bass is speaking, I'm sneaking into a lecture.

Review: Jesus, Interrupted by Bart D. Ehrman

In the early years of my decade-spanning journey from pastor to academic, I was enrolled in a course at the University of Alberta titled simply, "Jesus." The three textbooks we had assigned to us were: John Dominic Crossan's Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography, which contains the unqualified statement "Jesus was not born of a virgin, not born of David's lineage, not born in Bethlehem, there was no stable, no shepherds, no star, no Magi, no massacre of the infants and no flight into Egypt" (28); Jesus in History, Howard Clark Kee's far more even and fair assessment of the historical Jesus, which I would recommend to any serious student of biblical historical criticism; and Bart D. Ehrman's Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millenium. This trinity of historical critical works, along with Jonathan Z. Smith's Drudgery Divine, nearly shattered my faith in the resurrection. I found myself on Easter Sunday, preaching a sermon on Mary's words, "They have taken my Lord away...and I don't know where they have put him" (John 20:13 NIV). At the end of that particular semester, I could really identify with her.

Nearly 10 years later, I'm wishing it had been Ehrman's latest book on the syllabus. Jesus, Interrupted, while qualifying for one of the most misleading titles of the year, is subtitled Revealing the Hidden Contradictions in the Bible (and Why We Don't Know About Them), which is the book's truer, albeit less marketable moniker. I was ready to dismiss this book as another one of the bastard children of the Jesus Seminar's legacy, which was exacerbated into a rabid frenzy by Dan Brown's infamous DaVinci Code. One more book about all the stuff the Vatican's been hiding from us? Nevertheless, familiar with Ehrman, and interested in how he was currently rehashing and reusing old material, I began reading.

Jesus, Interrupted was a more than pleasant surprise. I haven't read all of Ehrman's works, although I'm familiar with his reputation. In this book, he lays all his ideological cards out on the table in the first chapters, revealing his own journey to agnosticism, clarifying that historical criticism was not responsible for that agnosticism, and then stating that this book is not an expose of a clerical conspiracy, but rather an attempt to reveal at a lay level what many in the clergy already know, but for ambiguous reasons, are not preaching from the pulpit.

Ehrman's thesis, in a nutshell, as revealed in the subtitle, is that the Bible is full of contradictions, and this is not necessarily a bad thing. Furthermore, as Ehrman discusses in his final chapter, admitting these contradictions does not, of necessity, lead to a loss of faith. This balanced discussion contains no surprises for anyone who's read anything about historical criticism, with Ehrman using what I consider the lynchpin of the argument, the discrepancy in the time of the crucifixion chronicled in the four gospels. He follows this example up by challenging the usual response to the contradictions, which is the assumption that since the facts don't agree, it clearly never happened, or that clearly it doesn't matter, since the point is that Jesus was crucified. The when is immaterial. Instead, Ehrman encourages his reader to ask not "Was Jesus crucified" but also "What does it mean that Jesus was crucified?" And for this, Ehrman continues "little details like the day and the time actually matter" (27).

Whether one agrees with everything Ehrman puts forth in Jesus, Interrupted, his fair treatment of the subject matter cannot be denied. He delineates the difference between devotional and historical approaches, without being derogatory or dismissive of the former. Throughout the book he displays a genuine concern for proper study of the Bible, and an undeniable love of the material he studies, all the while reminding the reader that he is not a professing believer. In chapter seven, "Who Invented Christianity," he allows history to remain a complex process, rather than assuming that it was just the Council of Nicea or the ascension of Constantine which was some sort of ancient tipping point for Christianity to suddenly spring into being.

Christianity as we have come to know it did not, in any event, spring into being overnight. It emerged over a long period of time, through a period of struggles, debates, and conflicts over competing views, doctrines, perspectives, canons, and rules. The ultimate emergence of the Christian religion represents a human invention--in terms of its historical and cultural significance, arguably the greatest invention in the history of Western civilization. (268)

One could disagree with Ehrman here, and still conceivably come away without the feeling that their faith has been slandered. Ehrman pays Christianity a very high compliment here, one mirrored in Dinesh D'Souza's What's So Great About Christianity? I am in unequivocal agreement with Ehrman on several points he makes in Jesus, Interrupted, and while I am guarded about some of his conclusions, my reading of this book felt more like an amicable conversation about the academic study of the bible over coffee or beer than it did an attack on the innerancy of the Word of God. I went away from reading it encouraged, and strengthened in my own faith position. As Ehrman rightly says, "a historical-criticism approach to the Bible does not necessarily lead to agnosticism or atheism. It can in fact lead to a more intelligent and thoughtful faith--certainly more intelligent and thoughtful than an approach to the Bible that overlooks all of the problems that historical critics have discovered over the years" (272).

In the years that followed my "Jesus" course, I had to fight my way through wondering whether accepting historical criticism meant I had to give up on my faith. After all, I was denying everything Josh McDowell had ever written about, and in the late 80s and early 90s, making the statement that McDowell was wrong was a sort of Evangelical heresy. I'm no longer an Evangelical Christian, but I am still firmly rooted in the religious identity of some sort of Christian. Ehrman's Jesus, Interrupted gave me a bit more licence to remain Christian, while still admitting there are some serious textual issues when it comes to the bible. I had learn all this the hard way, and while I'm of Schopenhauer's opinion when it comes to experienced knowledge as superior to read knowledge, I must nevertheless recommend this book. I recommend it for anyone who has some serious questions about the contradictions in the bible, but continue to choose to believe in the truth of the resurrection. I'll end this review with Ehrman's words on the subject, since they're rather powerful. I'm strongly convinced they could have been the closing remarks of my Easter Sunday sermon so many years ago. Maybe they will be for some unpreached Easter Sunday sermon I have yet to give.

The resurrection of Jesus was not a historical event that could proved or disproved, since historians are not able, by the nature of their craft, to demonstrate the occurence of a miracle. It was a bold mythical statement about God and the world. This world is not all there is. There is life beyond this world. And the horrible actions of humans, such as crucifying and innocent man, are not the end of the story. Evil does not have the last word; God has the last word. And death is not final. God triumphs over all, including death itself. (276)

Book Review: The Great Hunt by Robert Jordan 8/10

Darrell Sweet's crappy cover of the Great Hunt

Anyone familiar with Gotthammer knows that the past 5 years have been busy ones for me, and that the site always suffers when the coursework is dense. Regular guests here also know that I have determined to re-read (which means listen to the audio books) all eleven installments of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series in preparation for the release of the final book in September of 2009. I lost out on October entirely, as my I-pod was co-opted by audio books for my classes. When I finished Anil's Ghost two weeks ago, I realized I'd run out of school related audiobooks for the time being, and that I could finally listen to something I wanted to for my commutes (not that my selection of texts this semester has been onerous. With any luck, I'll blog about them over Christmas break). Like comfort food, I returned to the Wheel of Time series, picking up in mid-read (listen) of the second book, The Great Hunt.

A warning to the neophytes: these reviews are full of spoilers, and are really intended as ruminations for other fans of Wheel of Time.

Cover to Part one of the Youth Edition of the Great Hunt.

Whereas Eye of the World has one of my favorite openings and what I deem an uneven final quarter, The Great Hunt starts out clunky and uneven (which is where it loses points), but finds its stride somewhere around the middle of the novel, after Rand has reclaimed the Horn of Valere and Egwene and Nynaeve are firmly ensconced in the White Tower. At this point, the narrative takes off, maintaining suspense and tension both within the chapters as well as the overall story arc, a method Jordan will perfect over the next few books. It is the basis for why I suggest that Wheel of Time would make a great television series, as the chapters are often of an episodic nature, containing conflict and resolution as well as unresolved tension in encapsulated installments. Furthermore, the Jordan formula mirrors television seasons in the way the climactic scenes both bring closure to the current novel, while leaving enough open-ended aspects to keep readers eagerly anticipating more.

Jordan has stated in an interview with Audible.com that one of his goals with the series was to explore how realistic self-interest would figure into the heroic epic fantasy. Jordan develops this theme throughout The Great Hunt, laying groundwork for the three male protagonists dislike for the larger-than-life roles they will be playing in their own story by the middle of the series. It finds its apogee in this book in the scene where Rand begs Thom Merrilyn to accompany him further on his adventures. Thom's refusal is based on his acceptance of a rather domestic possible future, an entirely self-serving basis for his rejection of the heroic quest. With consummate balance however, Jordan writes Ingtar's death in the reverse of Thom's decision; his earlier self-interested motivations are what drive him to a classic fantasy trope, the flawed hero's redemption through self-sacrifice. His final moments are evocative of the Spartan 300's defensive gambit combined with the tragic hamartia of Boromir: "One man holding fifty at a narrow passage. Not a bad way to die. Songs have been made about less" (653).

What is most fascinating about a return to the beginnings of the series after having made one's way through the completed works to date, is the vast scope of Jordan's vision. It is difficult to know without access to Jordan's notes how much he knew of the narrative arc, but it is safe to say that contrary to his critics, he has never wasted time on inconsequential characters. Nearly every time a character steps into a scene and Jordan gives a lengthy, detailed description, I'm recognizing them. Many characters who will play pivotal roles in the later novels are introduced, and developed in The Great Hunt. We meet nobles from the great houses of Cairhienen who will be Rand's allies and antagonists in future volumes, see relationships which begin in animosity which will someday turn to amour, and understand Min's viewings better than she can. I am more aware in the re-reading of how monstrous the Seanchan seem to be, made all the more poignant by the knowledge of how very human some of them will be rendered in the later novels. One can also see the youthful, hopeful Rand slipping away, and the cold, calculating man he will have become by the end of book five beginning to emerge. In fact, if the first book is characterized by the phrase "in the stories," then The Great Hunt is characterized by the phrase, "we aren't the same anymore," a thought that passes through the minds of the three men from the Two Rivers on several occasions.

My theory that Egwene and Nynaeve are also ta'veren is also strengthened in this novel. Even as Rand is Forrest Gumping his way into Daes Damar, the Machievallian Game of Houses, Egwene finds herself the roommate of Elayne, heir to the throne of Andor, while Nynaeve's testing results in her doing things no other Aes Sedai has done before. The idea of ta'veren is an explanation for the contrivance of this small group from the same geographical area all having exceptional abilities, and its absence in explaining the women seems conspicuous. One wonders if it is not Jordan who overlooked the ta'veren nature of the women, but just the characters in the novel, given that the worldview regarding ta'veren seems to be that only men can be such.

I also continue to be amazed by how satisfying the idea of ta'veren, and by extension, the weaving of the Wheel as secondary world philosophy explaining why the Emond's Fielders are not only exceptional, but attract exceptional people to them, ultimately proves to be. It addresses the vast scope of the series as a weaver would a fabric - the integration of the weave into the pattern is not arbitrary, but transparently contrived, and is a justified contrivance. The ontological stability of the secondary world Jordan has created rests upon this weaving. Again, detractors would state that he never completes the weaves, but without having read the finished work (now having passed to another weaver's hands to find conclusion) none of us can state this with impunity. Most fantasy novels create such deus ex machina to explain the extraordinary amount of coincidence these narrative necessitate, but few do it in as self-reflexive and in regards to narrative, satisfying fashion. Beyond the contrived ontology, a conversation between Thom and Rand underscores the goal of Jordan's project concerning the instability of truth over distances, be they geographical or temporal. When Rand asks Thom about the Karaethon Cycle, Thom's response reads like literary theory: "The Old Tongue has music in it...Translations don't have the same sound, unless they're in High Chant, and sometimes that changes meanings even more than most translations" (386). One could write an essay on literary theory regarding Jordan's ontological loom. It's something I bat about in my head as I listen to the books this time around (Phil, maybe this should be your M.A. thesis?).

Casting call merited some new possibilities, keeping in mind I am positing a hypothetical television series, not movie: While I know this will likely be controversial, I think Eva Longoria Parker would make a decent Moirane, based on her height and ability to play a woman with stubbornly adversarial inclinations who is, nonetheless, physically attractive. I think Parker also has a certain ageless quality to her features requisite for the Aes Sedai characters.
And I've decided on a Thom Merrilyn. I would cast Richard Roxburgh, who proved as the Duke in Moulin Rouge! and Dracula in Van Helsing he possesses the diverse vocal dynamic for delivering those bardic moments; can dance; and under duress, could likely sing. As for juggling, when you've got the option for a cutaway edit, you can be made to look like you're doing just about anything. I think he's old enough to age with makeup believably, but young enough that the physical demands of the part wouldn't require a double aside from stunt work. His facial features would work as Thom, given a set of long mustaches.

One final word on the television idea: The season finale would of course involve the battle between Rand and the false Ba'alzamon as well as the women's escape, but I would frame the entire episode with intercut scenes of people telling the rumors of what happened at the battle. For example, I would show Child Byar reporting that Perrin was responsible for the double-cross, and then cut to a scene involving Perrin, or show a person in a pub talking about how Rand had appeared in the sky, and then cut to Rand fighting "Ba'alzamon".

NOTE: I did a calculation of how many listening hours it will actually take me to get through all 12 books, including prequel, before the release of The Memory of Light in September. The total time required to listen to the series is approximately 345 hours. I have all the confidence in the world that when the final installment is added, it will easily require one hour of reading out loud daily to complete the entire series. As a result, given my current course-load (I'm going into another semester of 3 full time courses, while teaching not 3, but now 4 classes), I won't reach my goal. However, rest assured that given how much I'm enjoying taking the journey back through the books leading up to the finale, I'll keep posting these reflections regularly in the year to come.

All images except covers by Seamus Gallagher, the best WoT artist ever.

Book Review: The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan 10/10

In anticipation of the September 2009 release of A Memory of Light, the final book in Robert Jordan's fantasy epic series, The Wheel of Time, I'm revisiting the entire series month-by-month.

All images in this series will be from the character renderings of Seamas Gallagher, whose art is the definitive WoT artwork for me.

Coming back to The Eye of the World right after finishing the 11th book in the series was like getting together with an old friend you have very fond memories of. It's been over fifteen years since I bought the trade-paperback first edition of Eye of the World and devoured it, enjoying the familiar fantasy plot conventions as an introductory book to what I then took to be yet another Tolkien clone, albeit a good one. This time I experienced the book as a literary scholar, a man approaching middle age, listening to it on audiobook, with the attention of a close read, since audiobooks preclude the option to skim or skip passages.

I'm also aware of Jordan's intentions with the series, not only of where characters will eventually end up, but also from a thematic perspective, thanks to an interview with Jordan at the end of the audiobook for Knife of Dreams. Knowing those intentions made re-reading the first book a richer experience than it might have been, despite the love I have for it.

In the interview, Jordan stated that one of his intentions was to play with the idea of what would really happen if a rural farm boy was told he was the savior of the world. How would real people, with real concerns, fears, emotions and desires do when faced with the invitation to the heroic quest? In speaking about this standard epic fantasy trope, Jordan invokes Tolkien. So the oft-complained about similarities to Tolkien are very intentional. Unlike Terry Brooks, who simply seemed to be writing "Lord of the Rings for Dummies" with his bestselling Sword of Shannara, a book which slavishly and shamelessly followed the general plot line of the Rings trilogy, Jordan employs the familiar conventional plot moments to communicate this major theme of his series: what would really happen if Gandalf came to town and told you to go on a quest to save the world?

So yes, the Two Rivers are like the Shire, the flight to Taren Ferry is very much like the race to the Brandywine River, Baerlon is a lot like Bree, The Ways and Shadar Logoth are much like Moria, Thom Merrilin's sacrificial battle with the Myrdraal echoes the Bridge of Khazad-dum, and Master Gill and the Queen's Blessing seem to have been crafted from similar muses as Barliman Butterbur and the Prancing Pony. However, all those elements are mixed into a story that is vastly different from The Lord of the Rings, as is evidenced clearly in subsequent books.

Yet even in The Eye of the World there is already a difference between Tolkien and Jordan. Tolkien wanted to write a mythology for England. Jordan wanted to write a piece of historical fiction about such mythologies. In a way, The Eye of the World is to Tolkien what Eaters of the Dead is to Beowulf. Jordan's characters experience those iconic high-fantasy moments, but they do in a fashion which always retains Jordan's rich layers of verisimilitude. This is the reason for the painstakingly detailed descriptions. It's the reason the later books can contain nearly 1000 pages wherein nothing earthshaking occurs. Because in order to present that strong sense of secondary reality, Jordan focuses on his characters, not the events they are caught up in.

Jordan's novels are a little like watching a Michael Mann film; a lot of screen-time is devoted to the building of characters, so that when the action set pieces happen, they are all the more riveting. Consider the pace of Mann's Heat: the majority of the film has the speed of drying paint. When the bank heist finally occurs, the speed with which the action is presented causes our hearts to race. Jordan's characters move through the fantasy world of Wheel of Time with similar pacing. Jordan can rest in banality for a good long while, so that when they Myrdraal, or Trolloc, or whatever shows up to threaten our heroes, we care whether or not they live or die.


The Eye of the World has a much faster pace than the later books will, but it is still primarily focused on developing characters rather than displaying grand epic battles or magical set pieces. It is largely concerned with Rand, Mat, and Perrin; Egwene and Nynaeve will not come into their own for several books yet. This was a brilliant move for the first book, given that there was no guarantee any sequels would be released. The book focuses on Rand above the other two (although it plants seeds for the multitude of plot-threads Jordan will weave in later books), and is able to reach a point of closure and conclusion so that, if Eye of the World had been the only Wheel of Time book ever published, it would have been fairly satisfying in terms of closure.

This was one of Jordan's true gifts as a writer: to bring a strong sense of closure to the end of his books while simultaneously hanging the reader over a cliff. There will always be unresolved elements at the end of each novel, but each book ties up in a relatively neat package.

From a nostalgic standpoint, it was nice to tread familiar ground once again, and find it loaded with new surprises, the result of seeing where the multitude of plot and character threads end up playing out.

I love the opening chapters of the book for the way in which Jordan plays up the parallels between the beginning of Fellowship of the Ring and Eye of the World, all the while presenting these somewhat tired conventions in fresh ways. I think my love for it stems from having been roughly Rand, Mat and Perrin's age the first time I read Eye of the World. The three boys are like college age hobbits, minus the diminutive statures. I could resonate with hobbits better before I stood six foot and was interested in girls. But as a young man just out of high school, it was a joy to read the same plot line of leaving the Shire, with young men who were my age, who had the same sorts of concerns I did.

Reading through reviews on Amazon, you'll likely find many who complain of Jordan's use of the Tolkienesque formula followed by so many other major fantasies before Wheel of Time. I don't think Jordan is using it as a template however. In an interview with Audible.com, Jordan revealed that he wanted to explore what the "Hobbits fleeing Black Riders" template would look like if it were dealing with real people. So while Eye of the World follows many of the conventions employed by Terry Brooks, and more recently, Christopher Paolini, it is my opinion that Jordan was using these familiar fantasy tropes to clearly set forth his thesis. What would happen, Jordan is asking, if the wise wizard (in this case Aes Sedai) showed up to reveal the savior of the world, and he refused to cooperate? Further, Jordan's use of Tolkien's plotline from Fellowship of the Ring further underscores one of the series' other major themes, which is how information gets passed along in a pre-industrial world, and how that information gets changed as it passes through many hands. "In the stories" is an oft-repeated phrase throughout Eye of the World, and since the Wheel of Time has woven many other ages (including our own), it is conceivable that Jordan was giving a nod to Tolkien wanted to draw upon myths and legends, perhaps implying that it was this story which gave birth to the myths and legends Fellowship of the Ring drew upon as inspiration.

Jordan's concept of Time's weave as it regards ta'veren is a stroke of genius as well, as it effectively explains the need for sometimes nearly deus ex machina coincidences. If the thread's of Time's weave have spun the three heroes out into the weave, then it only follows the weave wants to make sure they are preserved. I had asked in an earlier post why only men are ta'veren and was glad when Moraine says that Egwene and Nynaeve are "perhaps" ta'veren. Although we never gain any confirmation of this in the first book, the subsequent novels definitely see these two strong females along with Elayne creating a secondary trinity of female ta'veren.

Still, the first book belongs to the boys: to Rand's youthful optimism, gone all together too quickly in the next book; Perrin's nearly pessimistic resignation, for which only Faile's love will be the balm; and Mat's mischief, which never really goes away in the series. In that way, Mat is somewhat like Sam, always reminding us of the place we began, so that we remember why we are enduring this long road down the pattern to book 12.

NOTE: In reading book one in such a deliberate fashion, I have settled upon some of my actors for my hypothetical television series. Please remember, that even though this is hypothetical, I want my choices to mirror some sense of reality, so most of the actors I choose will be television actors, not film ones. In the role of Rand, I would choose someone like Jared Padalecki, although he is already too old to play the role. In the role of Mat, I'd want someone like Matt Czuchry, who would encapsulate the mischief very well I think. And for Lan, I'd want Richard Burgi, who I'm positive could pull off the stone-faced warder, and who really needs a break to play a nice guy with a heart of stone. That's all for this time around, although I'm sure by the end of book 2 I'll know who's playing the ladies. And I'm very open to suggestions for a young actor to play Perrin. He's a tough one. Thom Merrilyn is also proving an incredible difficulty, since the actor must be able to sing.

See ya next month with book 2!

Book Reflection: Save Me From Myself by Brian "Head" Welch

I heard about Brian "Head" Welch's conversion back in 2005 when I was visiting my parents in Medicine Hat. There was an article in the Medicine Hat news titled something to the effect of Guitarist for Metal Band finds Jesus or something equally accessible to the largely senior citizen population of my home town. My mom asked if I knew "this band," and I recall being a mix of emotions. I was shocked because I couldn't have guessed the "Metal Band" would end up being Korn, a group I was marginally into: I loved their music, and hated Jonathan Davis' lyrics, with the exception of Falling Away from Me and Make me Bad. What I had most appreciated about their music was the haunting, spooky guitar lines and the big fat sound of layered low-tuned 7 string guitars, both Korn guitar trademarks. I couldn't tell you if that was due to Head's influence (although his solo release single "Flush" would lead one to conclude thusly), but my reaction at the time was the result of years of listening to Christian rock when I was a teenager and praying bands like Metallica would get saved. I was excited Head might work on a solo project which would have elements of the Korn sound without Jonathan Davis' lyrics. I would have been excited about his conversion if I'd known all the reasons, but the article didn't go that far. Head's autobiography, Save Me From Myself: How I Found God, Quit Korn, Kicked Drugs, and Lived to Tell My Story, goes that far, and beyond.

I'm not a big fan of autobiographies. I like to read about people's experiences, such as Bruce Feiler's Walking the Bible, or Touching the Void by Joe Simpson, or in the vein of life-changing spiritual experiences, Bruce Marciano's In the Footsteps of Jesus. I'm interested in the moment of crisis, not necessarily the life that leads to it, at least not told in excruciating detail. I like Christian autobiographies even less because they often seem to fall into the same trap the popular evangelistic testimonies did in the 80's: "I used to do drugs/drink too much/have wild sex and then I found Jesus and it was all good." Or the equally popular "I could have been a millionaire/a rock star/a famous actor but I gave it up for Jesus so I could be here speaking to you." So why would I be interested in Welch's book? One, because as I've already stated, I liked Korn's sound and was genuinely interested in finding out what had happened to Welch. Second, because Brian Welch wasn't saying he could have been somebody. From a success perspective, he was somebody, which is why his conversion was so shocking. I wanted to know why a person would leave the fame and money behind. And third, I was badly in need of a good testimony. It's been too long since I've warmed my hands at the flame of a new Christian's fervor and zeal. I was looking for a little inspiration I guess.

It takes a long time to get to the inspiration in Save Me From Myself, but I found myself engaged in Welch's journey for the simple fact that he's roughly my age, and had similar goals. I wanted to be a rock star as well, though obviously not nearly as bad. Nevertheless, I had no trouble picturing his youthful years, the hairstyles and guitar bodies, the sound of the music and the reasons Korn was different in their sound. The first portion of the book is mainly concerned with Welch's addiction to drugs and alchohol and the cyclical nature of his attempts to come clean. It serves well as a memoir of his days of rock and roll debauchery, but gets redundant at times with a near grocery-list accounting of the types of drugs Welch was using. It also deals largely with the fractured relationship he had with his daughter's mother, and the difficulties they faced. And it deals with these events in all their awful glory, not edited for television. This book is not for those who like their Christian autobiographies stripped of sex, substance abuse, and the seven words you can't say on television. I can speed-read, and did so for this portion of the book, simply due to the spiralling repetition of the events, the 'Groundhog Day' nature of Welch's lifestyle. I wanted to get to the moment of crisis, when the change occurred.

I'm glad to say that while the press has framed Welch's conversion as sudden, and media for the book purports his religious experience as leaving him clean from substance abuse without any repurcussions, Welch's journey is much like everyone else's: one step at a time. I have never personally known anyone whose conversion experience was a complete 180 moral turn, even if it seems that way initially. I'm also glad that Welch had no such expectations, or he'd likely have given up early on. He speaks of regressions into drug use, old patterns of behaving, and how Christ is making him into something new. There is no sense of complete arrival. We can tell he's in process, a work in progress, not finished yet. But this is clearly a man whose life has been changed.

I was uncomfortable that it was a seemingly Charismatic group who brought Welch to Christ, since I myself am uncomfortable with Charismatic churches. Not Charismatics mind you. I have some good friends who are Charismatic or Pentecostal. I just don't like it when they get together in large groups. However, I'm thankful for the mental stretch this required of me. If Head had gotten saved by a bunch of Baptists, I wouldn't have a growing edge off the book. I need to be reminded that God works through all his children, not just the ones I'm theologically comfortable with. All that said, I like Welch's take on denominationalism, in that he's "not into it." I'm not really sure we can ever truly not be into denominationalism; our Christianity bears the imprint of the groups we worship with, but I'm a fan of what Lewis called Mere Christianity and what Dinesh D'Souza calls traditional Christianty, and it seems that Brian Welch is too.

I wouldn't say I finished the book and felt inspired. Not in the way I'd hoped. But I did feel challenged in a few areas, primarily to get back to reading my Bible more often. That's what I mean about warming my hands at the flame of new zeal. New Christians often devour the Bible. I nibble and pick at it these days, and it's nice to have a reminder that spiritual health is directly related to our mental diet. On that note, the statement which most impacted me concerned Welch's choice of music in the wake of his conversion. He effectively said that he wasn't precluding the option to listen to mainstream music, but that he wanted to fill his head with things which pointed him toward Christ.

I can relate to that statement. I've had many conversations with people about why I don't listen to Tool an awful lot, despite my love for their sound. I just can't bring myself to listen to Maynard's lyrics repeatedly. As the man himself said, when he sang "fuck your God" in "Judith" (a Perfect Circle song, but indicative of most of Maynard's lyrical propensity), he wasn't referring to some made-up God. So for me, listening to Tool is the faith analogue of hanging around with someone who constantly and vehemently bad-mouths my wife, to the extent of making overt statements that I should never have married her. That's why I love Chevelle, especially when they sound most like a Tool knock-off. I get the sound without the invective.

I realize that some of my past posts might lead someone to assume I don't like "Christian music" but that's not necessarily true. I don't like subculture music. I love music that encourages and uplifts, which teaches and instructs, which acts as prophecy and prayer. When I was in my teens I was a huge fan of pre-John-Schlitt Petra, Rez Band, Undercover, Daniel Amos, The Choir and Michael W. Smith, just to name a few. I still try my best to stay informed as to the latest and hottest acts in the Christian or "Christian by association" scene. My current faves are P.O.D., Skillet, Flyleaf, Mute Math, and Project 86. Sometimes I force myself to take a break from the likes of Rammstein and Nine Inch Nails, just to make sure I'm getting intake of music that lifts my soul up to Christ. Its not that I find the other music drags me down into hell mind you, just that the intention of the lyrics in bands which are unabashedly Christian is less ambiguous, and in my experience, lends me a better footing in my faith when I need it.

But I like quality as much as I like content. I want the music to have integrity on its own. Good lyrics with bad music doesn't strike me as a serious sacrifice of praise. So I'm glad that someone with Head's musical chops will soon be adding his stamp to the category of sacred music. Admittedly, from what I've heard so far, his lyrics will leave something to be desired in terms of maturity and growth, but I'm cool to listen to a baby Christian find his way in the world, given that he'll be playing music with a 30-something ability. In a way, it seems to me like this will be the sequel to Make Me Bad, which admitted the Christian view of the human condition without the Christian view of a Cosmos with a Savior who could give you a hand up. Having read Save Me From Myself, I'm clear that Head has a firm grasp of that Savior-filled Cosmos, and it's a good place to be living, loving and playing music that will eat through concrete. After all, why should the devil have all the good music?

Book Review: The Terror - 9/10

Dan Simmon's "The Terror" is to the Franklin Expedition what "Pan's Labyrinth" is to Franco's Spain. That is to say, the book is as much a mix of history, horror and fantasy as Del Toro's film is, and achieves this pastiche with an equal level of success. The premise is simple; Simmons imagines the doomed expedition, trapped not only by the elements of the Arctic, but by something more elemental, a physical monstrosity which is killing the men off. I have likened it to John Carpenter's The Thing, but with Kurt Russell in the role of Captain Francis Crozier of the H.M.S. Terror, a role Russell would be sufficiently aged enough to play at present. I'm not implying the "thing on the ice" is an alien. I'm not going to say anymore about the nature of the beast, and have betrayed no spoilers in revealing its presence in the book. The book's jacket liner will tell you as much, and the first chapter makes several references to its presence and malevolent nature. I will warn you that you'll need to read the whole book to find out exactly what "it" is, and that many might find the journey too long and arduous, although I'm of the opinion that this was Dan Simmon's intention.

In truth, the monster is an interesting sideline to the story, but Simmons is thoroughly concerned with his cast of historical characters, especially Crozier, and the reason for turning the pages is the growth and development of the men of the Expedition, not the unraveling of the mystery surrounding the monster's identity, though that certainly makes for an enticing motivator. As with "Pan's Labyrinth," the most monstrous actions are done on the part of the humans, and the historical facts of cannibalism on the expedition, when they finally rear their ugly head, outstrip the fantastical "terror" by far.

Simmons has a deft hand when it comes to explicating historical information within the action of a page-turning scene. He is far more fond of showing us than telling us, and passages that would have been dry exposition in the hands of a lesser word-smith are rendered page-turners, as is especially the case with a surgery late in the book. Ultimately though, Simmons is about the men within this historical setting. The book is historical insofar as it appears thoroughly researched and meticulously crafted to produce verisimilitude. It is horror insofar as it produces fear, employing all the means Stephen King laid out in "Danse Macabre" for evoking horror, even the last resort, the "gross-out." It is fantasy insofar as it deals with the supernatural, or at the very least the possibility thereof. And additionally, it is philosophical, pondering the question of whether or not Hobbes was right in his "Leviathan" when he claimed that life is poor, nasty, brutish, and short. The interplay between the historical and the fantastic hold that question in tension until the very last page of the book, and possibly beyond, leaving the reader to ponder how they themselves are stuck in the ice, trapped in a cold, violent world which seeks to devour them.

How to Read Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time

In 1990, I picked up a book by a writer named Robert Jordan, who at the time was mainly known among fans of fantasy for the Conan novels he penned, which were among my favorites at the time. Seeing one of my favorite post-Howard Conan writers had written something entirely his own, I bought the trade paperback without a moment's hesitation. I was not at all disappointed. The Eye of the World, the first novel in the Wheel of Time series, followed the classic formula high fantasy had been treading since Tolkien wrote of Sam and Frodo leaving the Shire with Nazgul in pursuit. The difference was, that unlike Terry Brooks' Shea and Flick Ohmsford, the young adventurers leaving their village were not vertically challenged, and several were females. And the differences didn't end there.

Getting to the end of the book and realizing it was the first in the series was icing on the cake of a thrilling, fast paced fantasy read. And the second book in the series, "The Great Hunt," while it didn't live up to the expectation "Eye of the World" had set, was still very good. I couldn't wait for what I assumed would be the conclusion, the third book in the series. After all, nearly all high fantasy before the 90's was wrapped up in a trilogy, wasn't it?

Alas, "The Dragon Reborn" did not wrap up the story, and in a pre-Internet world, I had no way of knowing that Jordan intended for 12 books total. I'm not sure anyone following the series in those days did. And by the time book 6 came out, I was sick of waiting for things to wrap up. The way I sawy it, while Terry Brooks had pumped out two Shannara trilogies, he'd had the good sense to wrap things up at the end of each book so fans weren't hung out to dry waiting.

So I got stuck at book seven for several years. Although I had no intention of ever reading them, I kept getting the books as they were released. I thought long and hard about selling all but the first book, since I'd read it three times in the course of reading up to book 6 (I found that I needed to re-read the whole series when book 6 came out, as I couldn't remember who the hell half the characters were).

The reason I started reading the series again was friend Jeff Nelson. Jeff is a voracious reader and had read all of the books. Where many others had given up, he'd persevered, and still had many good things to say about the series. So Jeff was my initial inspiration.

The way I got over the hump of Book 7 was Audible.com. I've been a gold member for awhile, and had been thinking about using the unabridged audio version of Book 7 to get me started again. I listen to books on my I-pod while doing yard work, shoveling the walk, or driving. Last year, as I was working hard on our yard and basement, I began listening to Book 7, sure that I'd be using it to augment my actual reading of the book.

I'm not sure I've picked up a Jordan novel since. But I am about to begin Book 11. And I'm looking forward to the posthumous collaboration of Jordan with Brandon Sanderson sometime next year. So, to all those who have given up on Jordan, and wished they hadn't, or to those who are thinking about starting but have heard too many negative reviews, here's how I recommend reading Robert Jordan's "Wheel of Time" series.

I'd like to begin with a few words to Jordan's detractors.

1. Understand that Jordan as a writer, loves detail. He will describe clothing in so much detail, that if "Wheel of Time" ever gets optioned for film (it needs to be a television series, but more about that in a moment), the costume designers will be able to go for a hell of a lot of coffee breaks. He is fond of giving elaborately detailed descriptions of every character, even the minor ones. If you can't handle that, shut up and stop reading the series.

2. The repetition of previously established plot elements in subsequent books is for the people traveling on planes who pick up book 5 in the airport. It allows them to enter the world enough to get through the read. It's a device publishing companies use with bestselling series like this one to ensure that the series remain a bestseller. While I have never started any series mid-way through, some people apparently do, and these passages are for them. If you can't handle that, shut up and stop reading the series.

3. Jordan likes to weave intricate plots with a cast of characters so large it necessitated a glossary at the end of each book. Many of the books are entirely character based, and so seem to have "no action" taking place. This is because you as a reader want someone to storm a tower, engage in a climactic battle, or throw a ring into a fiery pit. Jordan is too busy marrying characters or introducing a new plot thread to bother with such things. And while he may not talk about a character for one book, he has almost always gotten back around to them later on. If you don't like character development the way Jordan does it, shut up and stop reading the series.

4. Bottom line: There are already enough posts all over Internet chat rooms, Amazon, and Indigo (or the other online bookseller of your choice) telling us about why they are no longer reading Jordan to sink the Titanic again. If you gave up on the series, just write "ditto to so-and-so's review, I gave up too" and get on with your life. Just shut up and stop reading the series.

So, now that I've announced that I know why people generally give up on the series (which were reasons I shared), let me tell you how I got back on the Wheel.

1. I started thinking about "Wheel of Time" as a television series. It's long enough to sustain several seasons, the iron is hot for the striking insofar as fantasy media goes, and the cast is basically Beverly 90210 (or whatever teen drama is currently hip - sue me, I'm old) meets Lord of the Rings. The cast would be young, attractive and cool, and the setting would be cool in the current deluge of fantasy films. But it's too damn long for a single film installment, so a television series makes the most sense. I got to thinking about how we watch television series, which is one episode at a time. I began to view the chapters in each book as "episodes" of "Wheel of Time" as a television series, and each book as a "season." I don't like every episode of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and there are some seasons I like better than others. Some of my favorite episodes are in my least favorite seasons. But I love the characters, and I want to see what happens to them, so I tune in. I love Rand, Mat, Perrin, and many of the characters in Wheel of Time. I want to see what happens to them. So I keep tuning in.

2. I listen to them on audiobook. This is an extension of the "Wheel of Time" as television series concept, since it takes about 40 minutes or so to listen to a chapter. Some people just aren't that patient, but if you did it on your work commute or as part of housework, yardwork, or some other activity which would allow you to pay attention to the story without sawing your hand off, then you could easily get through a "season" of "Wheel of Time" before you know it. And Jordan's prose actually lends itself (in my opinion) better to audio than to regular reading. The repetition of how Aes Sedai do this or that is less annoying, because your brain is also thinking about washing the dishes.

3. I remember that Robert Jordan used to be a Dungeon Master for his kids. So much of "Wheel of Time" reads like a long-form role-playing campaign. I've got this nagging, but unconfirmed suspicion as a DM myself that many of the vignettes in "Wheel of Time" are narratively tightened versions of gaming moments. They just feel that way all too often. I find that thinking about "Wheel of Time" as a gaming campaign gives me ideas for my own gaming, especially in areas of character development. And it challenged me to run a campaign involving three different groups of players all playing in the same world and time period, but in different places, with their actions having major ramifications for each other's groups.

4. I got over the reasons I quit. Simply put, they were my reasons. I had expectations of Jordan he never intended to fulfill. I expected him to wrap it up in a trilogy. He didn't. I expected him to snap Rand out of his sullen funk. He didn't. I expected him to stop telling me about the embroidery on coats or dresses. He didn't. I expected him to bring a certain major character back from the dead. He didn't. And finally, I expected him to finish before he passed away. And he didn't.

It was that last one that really galvanized me. When I heard he had terminal cancer (many years after it was a reality), it got me thinking about the legacy the man would leave on this earth. An epic bestselling fantasy series. And I realized that, to quote Elvis and Sinatra, he'd done it his way. I might not like some of the choices Jordan made, but I love the world he created and the people walking through it. And I wanted to know how they fared in the end.

So that's my journey to Book 11 of "Wheel of Time" and I wanted to share it with everyone who visits my blog or reads my reviews at Amazon and Indigo, because I've enjoyed the journey. I want new readers to know what to expect, but also how to let go of those expectations, and to know that the journey is one worth taking. Especially if you want to be there when the final novel is released next year.

Me? I'll be starting book 1 this fall and listening to all the previous "Seasons" of "Wheel of Time," one per month, in anticipation of the final installment. The Wheel of Time turns...and I'll be turning pages with it.

NOTE: One final word. I'd like to add that while "Wheel of Time" is one of my top fantasy series of all time, I pray to the publishing gods at Tor to re-release the whole bloody series with new covers. Each time a new book comes out, I am further convinced that Darrell Sweet is not only the worst possible choice for cover illustrator for this series, but also that he has never read any of the books, or in the case of the first one, not even a description of the major characters. Judging from this post, I am not alone. In a perfect world, Keith Parkinson would have been the illustrator before he passed away. Since he is no longer an option, I'm suggesting Seamas Gallagher, who has done what I consider to be the best renditions of the characters from the series, with the exception of the interior art of the Wheel of Time roleplaying rules from Wizards of the Coast. Barring that, I'm ordering the whole series from the UK, where the covers, while a bit boring, are at the very least, not annoyingly inaccurate.

Book Review: Fitzpatrick's War by Theodore Judson: 10/10

A superb Neo-Victorian speculative work of alternate history, which tackles issues of war and peace, nationalism, manifest destiny, and the veneration of History. The book is appropriately slow paced, being the memoir of Sir Robert Mayfair Bruce, who writes of the ascension to power of the 'new world's greatest hero' Lord Fitzpatrick. Bruce's story (and particularly that of his family) answers the question many people have in the face of great historical change, asking "what can one person do to change anything?" Combining steampunk elements, fictional intertextuality, and poignant moments of human emotion and grace, Theodore Judson has created a book that, while easy to put down, compellingly beckons the reader to pick it back up. Highly recommended.

Book Review: Baltimore, or The Steadfast Tin Soldier and the Vampire 10/10

I took a course in my undergraduate literary studies called "Fantastic Literature". The reading list for this course included Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Bram Stoker's Dracula, H.P. Lovecraft's Dunwich Horror, and a long list of gothic tales, magic realism, and horror. It remains my favorite course taken.

Ever.

Reading Baltimore, or, The Steadfast Tin Soldier and the Vampire, a gift I found in my stocking Christmas morning brought back memories of that class. It is the story of Captain Henry Baltimore, who grapples with a vampire on the field of battle during World War I, an encounter which costs him his leg, and ultimately, everything he holds dear. His quest to destroy the vampire is the story, but it is the way in which it is told which makes the book brilliant. I can't say original ; it's more a hybrid homage, a pastiche of Victor Frankenstein's obsessive pursuit of his creation, of the vampire hunters who stalk Dracula, and Lovecraft's Shadow over Innsmouth, with poetic prose references to Andersen's fairy tale. It is told almost entirely in the first person, a key element of most fantastic literature, since it hinges on what Todorov calls "the moment of hesitation," or the idea that the story might not have happened, save in the twisted minds of the characters inhabiting the narrative.

The book has been marketed as a graphic novel, which it is not. It is an illustrated novel; Author/Illustrator Mike Mignola's images are only occasionally direct representations of the action happening in the narrative. Most of the time they are primarily evocative of a mood both Mignola and his co-writer Christopher Golden want to sustain throughout. The pictures help, but unlike Mignola's work on Hellboy, they are a pale reflection of the text, which is brilliant. The opening scenes upon the battlefield are juxtaposed with Baltimore's fevered recollections of playing with his tin soldiers as a boy; instead of resorting to lurid gory detail describing the massacre of Baltimore's platoon, Mignola and Golden utilize Andersen's fairy tale imagery to connote the deaths. The bodies piled in the trenches are compared to the soldiers being returned to the box.

If you are a fan of any of the books I have already mentioned, this book is a must read for you. And for the record, I've decided that if I ever teach a course in "Fantastic Literature", Baltimore will be on the required reading list.

Book Review: Hogfather - 7/10

Not Pratchett's funniest or best Discworld novel, but when considered against other possible holiday reads, especially within the fantasy genre, this one's a gem. I read it this December of as a placebo for not being able to see the film version made in the UK. The plot is simple; the Hogfather, Discworld's equivalent to Santa, has gone missing, and the hilariously deadpan Death has decided to take his place on Hogswatch night. Highly recommended if you're looking for something festive and are a fan of fantasy, British humor, Douglas Adams, or Christopher Moore. As with most of Pratchett's Discworld books, no prior knowledge of the other books in the series is necessary; it helps enrich, but does not hinder enjoyment.

The Golden Compass: Reflections on the 'danger' of Pullman's trilogy

I received the following email from my sister asking for my 'expert opinion'.

You may already know about this, but I just learned about a kids movie coming out in December starring Nicole Kidman. I believe it's called The Golden Compass, and while it will be a watered down version, it is based on a series of children's books about killing God (it is anti-Narnia).

Please follow this link, and then pass it on. From what I understand, the hope is to get a lot of kids to see the movie - which won't seem too bad - and then get the parents to buy the books for their kids for Christmas. The quotes from the author sum it all up. I'm going to tell everyone about this movie. I hope it totally bombs because we were all paying attention!

It's a quote from the Snopes.com page on the Golden Compass, replying to the allegation that "The 2007 film Golden Compass is based on a series of books with anti-religious themes". Snopes has ascertained that this is true. Sheer genius, this post. "I hope it totally bombs because we're all paying attention." The battle cry of the sign waving Christian. And after years of creating media storms through their own self-inflicted controversy, these people still don't understand that "telling EVERYONE about ANYTHING" simply raises its profile. Ever since the release of the film version of The Last Temptation of Christ I've been aware that this sort of protest results in the very opposite of what these people are hoping to achieve.

Any cursory search for information on the Narnia films will produce a link or two to Golden Compass' author, Phillip Pullman giving his highly critical opinion of C.S. Lewis and the Narnia Chronicles. I wrote a paper about it in my undergraduate which I posted here. It doesn't take a deep search to find out Phillip Pullman's anti-Christian sentiments. The DaVinci code this ain't, and you don't need a website devoted to urban legends to find this out.

I'll let you all know right off, that unlike the complete waste-of-time I opted not to watch in its inglorious entirety (see my Zeitgeist post), I have read all of Pullman's trilogy of which Golden Compass is the first book. In truth, I've read them twice; once by myself, and then again to my wife. I then read Golden Compass a third time in a close reading for an English course on Children's literature. That was during the height of the Evangelical Christian backlash against Harry Potter, and all I could think was, "It's a clear indication that Pullman's books don't have near the success of Rowling's, or Harry's evils would be yesterday's news." The attitude towards the Christian church is clear in these books. And its not a positive one.

That said, I don't think the books are evil. I don't think they pose a threat to my faith. Or anyone else's faith for that matter, unless their faith is the glass house type, that shatters at the first challenge given it.

My approach to ministry when I was a pastor was to encourage my students to think for themselves; most of the students at Holyrood have read the His Dark Materials series, and we had some good discussions about elements in the books over coffee.

My literary background is in Comparative Literature. One of the ways we approached texts in my coursework was to ignore who the author was, or what the author had stated was supposed to be the point of the text. For example, Tolkien said he hated allegory, but many readers find allegorical elements in his works. Or, Lewis was a Christian writer, but his books contain a good deal of pagan elements. Or, to the point at hand, Pullman is an atheist who writes about the death of God. But which God?

The God of the secondary world(s) of His Dark Materials is the God of first century gnosticism. It is a God who is no god at all, but an angel with a superiority complex who has fooled angelic hosts into thinking he's God. So we're not dealing with the God of Christianity, or Judaism or Islam. We're dealing with the God of gnosticism, a false God, whether you be a believer or not. Further, Lyra, the heroine of the series effectively defeats (with the aid of many heroic companions) this God after a death and rebirth scenario. As Gotthammer visitor 'Sapience' commented in my earlier post on Pullman, "I think Pullman actually ends up self-defeating in his polemic. Lyra ends up as a Christ figure; the conspicuous absence of the Son in novels based on Paradise Lost makes us look for Christ in her (did you notice that Jesus is only mentioned once in more than a thousand pages?). She harrows hell, her end choice is one of self-sacrificial love, etc. She's not Christ, but Pullman makes us think of Christ when we see her--and I don't think it's intentional either." There's a Christ story in the final book, albeit a generically mythic death-and-rebirth one, overlapping with Christianity where it contains shared mythic elements. So whatever Pullman says off the page about Christianity and organized religion, there are some very worthwhile themes in His Dark Materials for Christians and atheists alike to engage with. It is, as Cathy McSporran suggests in her excellent article on both Lewis' and Pullman's works, " a space 'where two worldviews collide'."

That's the strength of the books. While there is an overtly corrupt organized Church in Lyra's world, there is also a clear storyline of spiritual growth, of a redeemer figure, and of concepts of the afterlife. The book handles both sides with complex characters (although as I've noted in my paper, Pullman is sadly one-sided in his handling of the Church - those characters are all bad, whereas the rest of his cast has multi-faceted depth), and allows for an ambiguity that permits the reader to continue to choose their path. It leaves us with the option to join and help build the "Republic of Heaven". And when you read what Jesus says about his "Kingdom" of servants and love, I'd say the Kingdom and the Republic are less at odds and more in common than the Evangelical watchdogs would give credit for.

We always tell people we want them to make a choice for Christ. Choices cannot be made if the other options are suppressed. That's the sort of authoritarian religious activity Pullman is railing against. All the protesting will do is confirm his belief about Christianity.

On a final note, I'm looking forward to seeing it. And if I had kids old enough to comprehend it, I'd be taking them. All this philosophical musing aside, I'm all about armored polar bears.