Lamb

Have you ever been to an open mic night at a stand up comedy club and listened to a series of male comedians attempting to make jokes about their wives or how women don't like sex or similar topics, and it's completely cringeworthy because what they're actually doing, although they don't know it, is announcing to the entire club the degree to which they are completely clueless about the first thing about women? Reading this book was a bit like that feeling. There are occasional funny lines. The premise is good overall. But the way the main characters act and the way the minor characters are portrayed leaves you at the end of the book with the distinct feeling that the author, Christopher Moore, has a very limited vision of where women fit into his world, and it is pretty much equivalent to pieces of furniture that wants to have sex. Which says rather a lot more about Christopher Moore's narrow worldview and experience with women than he may possibly have intended to convey.

Cringe-worthy penis-centric worldview aside, as mentioned, the premise is amusing - 2000 years after Christ's death, the Almighty God for some reason decides to resurrect Christ's childhood friend Biff and lock him in a hotel room with an angel until he writes a new gospel from his own perspective. Since Biff is Christ's oldest friend, the first part of the book is focused on Christ as a 6 year old Jewish kid, getting into typical 6 year old scrapes as well as some atypical ones (like discovering he can resurrect dead lizards).

The book then follows Biff and Christ (called Joshua through the book) as they grow up, develop a crush on Mary Magdalene, meet John the Baptist, track down and study various other religions/philosophies with the three Wise Men who followed the star for Christ's birth, and then ultimately return to Galilee where Christ performs the various miracles as described in the bible and is crucified. Along the way Biff mostly tries to protect Christ, whose naivete is liable to get him mugged or killed, and also to have sex with as many women as he possibly can, a strange number of whom seem to want to have sex with Biff for no explained reason and despite the extreme improbability that any woman would find a young, scrawny, ignorant, unwashed, and completely clueless beggar kid in the slightest bit attractive for any reason. (See note about furniture, above.)

The early childhood part was probably the most interesting, mostly because this is a portion of Christ's life that isn't described in any surviving records so the author could make up anything he wanted rather than trying to fit into the rigid framework of biblical record; and also probably because Biff isn't old enough yet to be trying to have sex with everything. The middle of the book as they study things like Buddhism and Kung Fu with the Wise Men is pretty slow and reads a bit like a Karate Kid training montage. And the end has to fit to the "known" bible framework of the end of Christ's life so is pretty restricted and a little confusing if you're not extremely familiar with the details of the New Testament (I'm not Christian so although I have a vague memory of learning the general events as a child, I certainly don't remember much about the details.)

Overall there were some amusing moments but it was more slapstick humour and poop jokes than actual wit; this is no Douglas Adams or Terry Pratchett, for sure. It's been a while since I read any other books by this author but I recall liking them better than this one, maybe this is a low note. Or maybe it's just coasting on the shock value of the subject matter. In summary: meh.

When I read this book, it had been a tough month. I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

I've read 3 of Moore's books, Practical Demonkeeping and Bloodsucking Fiends along with Lamb. It has been a long while since I read these, although I did recognize Catch in Lamb. I was a little nervous to read this, as I was a bit worried about how far off Moore might have gone. I find his note interesting at the end that those who know the Gospels well enough to catch the places that are the same would be the least likely to read this book. I think that he almost loses on two points: one that those who are most likely to believe in Jesus as the Messiah would be put off by the irreverence and second that those who do not believe would not enjoy the primary assumption that Jesus is exactly who he is portrayed to be by the Gospels. So that those who fall into the two categories have a beef.

This was a fun and charming book. I found the beginning and ending most interesting, although the middle was the chunk of the story (it was seventeen years after all). I was disappointed to see how little of the novel was left when we got back to Nazareth. I very much liked the passion told from the point of view of the best friend. I don't think I've seen it portrayed so well that way before. This is how the followers and friends and family of Jesus would act in this situation. Isn't it likely?

Anyway, I did laugh, even out loud at some parts. I find the very end a little trite and not to my liking, but overall the rest of the novel overcomes the last couple pages.

As for Raziel, I couldn't get the angel from The Vintner's Luck out of my head at every single reference. Made for a really strange view of the angel that I know was not Moore's intent.