Steff Kennedy is an unlikely hero for an action thriller. One thing’s for sure: he’s no James Bond (nor even a Jason Bourne). Which is okay, because the villain in this piece, Rev. Luther St. John, is no Dr. No either. And author Christopher Brookmyre is no Ian Fleming.
I love a good thriller as much as the next person. There are many nights when I go to bed at 2 or 3 a.m. because I can’t put down the book in my hands. There are many mornings when I arrive at work bleary-eyed and fuzzy-headed because I didn’t put down the book in my hands until 2 or 3 a.m. Not the End of the World did not live up to the publisher’s promise (inscribed on the dust-jacket) that this book would “keep [me] furiously turning its pages.” In fact, it took me nearly a week to plow through it, reading perhaps 75-80 pages at a time before finally calling it quits for the night.
What’s wrong with this book? The plot for one thing. It reads like something that was inspired by some of the lesser James Bond films: a lunatic Christian evangelist schemes to bring America to God by causing a tidal wave to engulf Los Angeles and its environs at a time of his choosing. (Okay, this isn’t the plot of Licence to Kill, but that Bond film does feature a villainous evangelist.) This dastardly plot is foiled, after some twists and turns, by an unlikely team comprised of a photographer, a porn star and a policeman. Maybe it would work on film – where it could be enhanced by special effects and beautiful people (I’m talking lots of effects and the most beautiful people on the planet) – but it misses the mark, badly, on paper.
What’s wrong with this book? The characters for one thing. The villains are all religious kooks. The villains’ disciples are all kooky religious dupes. The heroes are all atheists whose experiences with religion have been unremittingly negative. The primary villain, Rev. St. John was – surprise, surprise – raised by his sexually dysfunctional mother. The secondary hero, or heroine (is that term still acceptable?), porn star Madeleine Witherson, was – surprise, surprise – sexually abused by her father, who is – surprise, surprise – a hypocritical Republican in the United States Senate. And, just in case you haven’t guessed it already, the hypocritical Republican Senator is a good friend of the right-wing religious fanatic villain, who is, in turn, a supporter of the Republican Senator. Good God! Brookmyre compounds his sin of religious stereotyping with that of political stereotyping! Did I miss Wal-Mart’s three-for-one special on cardboard characters? Brookmyre obviously didn’t.
I haven’t read any other books by Brookmyre and, based on my experience with this one, I’m not likely to do so. My recommendation is that you avoid this book and read something else. It won’t be the end of the world if you do so.
– the chaplain
Posted by Lifeguard on March 15, 2008 at 11:39 am
Perhaps I’m guilty of stereotyping myself here, but I’d assume many Christians would be surprised to find so many atheists being critical of a book where all the villains are believers and all the heroes atheists.
Posted by The Exterminator on March 15, 2008 at 11:54 am
chappy:
You know, I hadn’t thought about this until you brought it up. But, really, Dr. No and Goldfinger are as two-dimensional as Larry Freeman and Luther St. John. Yet — and, man, is that a big YET — those old James Bond books are great reads. That’s where writing ability comes in. I don’t want to create a whole other post here in a comment, but suffice it to say that Fleming was a genius of “pulp,” and Brookmyre is not.
Great closing line, by the way.
Lifey:
Good point. But we’ll probably never know unless one of those Christians chimes in. Which isn’t likely.
Posted by the chaplain on March 15, 2008 at 12:08 pm
Lifey:
You raise an interesting question. I think all of the nonbelieving literati expect the fictional characters we read about to be realistic. As the Exterminator mentioned in his post about this book, even though bloggers frequently write about the more outlandish manifestations of religion, most of us know that the vast majority of religious people are multi-dimensional people. We know them personally as friends, family, co-workers and so on. A novelist has a privilege that a blogger does not: the opportunity to create complex characters and to develop and explore the contradictory aspects of their personalities. Therefore, readers are justifiably indignant when an author approaches his task lazily and carelessly.
Exterminator:
I agree that Fleming’s stories are not “great literature,” but they are entertaining. That’s okay. Sometimes I read books and watch movies for the simple pleasure of being entertained rather than enlightened.
Posted by Evo on March 15, 2008 at 1:22 pm
The secondary hero, or heroine (is that term still acceptable?)
After your post on The Plague, I was kind of depending on you to provide the answer to this type of question. Maybe OG can help us out on this one.
I too loved Ian Flemings books. Then again, I read all of them between the ages of 16 and 22. But, if memory serves, Fleming did a great job in that genre and I recall being somewhat disappointed with the movie versions of the books. I still enjoyed them, but usually for a different reason than why I liked the books. I should go back and read From Russia, With Love and see if it holds up.
I’ve only read three posts on this book, but it seems pretty unanimous so far. Lifey, really good point. I wonder.
Posted by The Ridger on March 15, 2008 at 1:45 pm
Oh dear. I loved this book. (Well, of course, that’s why I chose it.) I didn’t think it was meant to be “photo-realistic” and that didn’t bother me. It’s not Brookmyre’s best by a long shot, but I still galloped through it.
Posted by Lifeguard on March 15, 2008 at 2:55 pm
I just think it’s interesting that we each expected more than simple caricatures of the people we disagree with and even object to what we think are unfair portrayals of a group of people we sometimes lampoon ourselves. That’s been the most fascinating part of the whole discussion. In that sense, I think Ridger made a great choice, if at least it got us thinking about that.
In any event, I’m looking forward to Chappy’s choice for our next title!
Posted by the chaplain on March 15, 2008 at 2:59 pm
Who said I was choosing the next title? Did I miss a memo?
Posted by The Exterminator on March 15, 2008 at 3:09 pm
chappy:
Did I miss a memo?
Yup.
Posted by Kagehi on March 15, 2008 at 3:32 pm
Actually, given some of the idiotic stuff I have seen in the last two years from both preachers (Falwell, etc.), their close friends (Falwell’s closet dildo + guns + two wet suits loving friend), and the most recent case of a real gung ho Republican, anti-sin, nut, who turned out to be running one of the prostitution rings in the city he worked in… How far is this book *really* from what you might find in real life? Seriously, every time someone parodies these people, or makes up some fake story about how insane a fictional one acts, one of them manages to do or be more insane than the parody. I am almost willing to bet right now that there is some one dimensional wacko, dressed in drag, surrounded by flunkies even more nuts than in the book, praying for the moon to fall on San Fransisco, and incidentally also tidal wave the terrorists out of existence in the process (never mind how impossible that combinations of events would be, since these people don’t do logic any better than sanity). Nothing we, or any mere author, could come up with would be as crazy as at least “one” of the crazies out there already imho. The only legitimate gripe might be suggesting that someone that crazy would automatically have a cabal of followers to help him.
Posted by the chaplain on March 15, 2008 at 3:51 pm
Kagehi:
Thanks for joining us. I may be wrong, but I thought Eliot Spitzer was a Democrat. Regardless of his official affiliation, the rest of your description is apt.
I agree that truth is often stranger than fiction. Did you pay any attention to the Richard and Lindsey Roberts stuff at Oral Roberts University last fall? Or the Earl Paulk story out of Georgia shortly thereafter? If any writer had made up that stuff, critics would have had a field day blasting the poor cretin!
My objection to Brookmyre’s characterizations of religious people is that his characters were utterly, remorselessly evil to their cores. They weren’t simply flawed human beings, they were nearly demonic. Did I mention that they were really bad people? Even Richard, Lindsey, Earl, Falwell, Bakker, Swaggart, Haggard and all the rest (well, maybe Haggard
– I jest) are not thoroughly incorrigible. People are multi-dimensional. Unless I’m reading a comic book (or a blog), I like my fictional characters to be identifiably human.
Posted by C. L. Hanson on March 16, 2008 at 2:45 am
I think it’s not so strange for atheists to expect a more complex portrayal of religion. It’s just not that interesting to see straw men get toppled on your behalf. Even when reviewing Philip Pullman my main complaint was with his overly-simplistic portrait of Christians as villains.
Posted by The Ridger on March 16, 2008 at 6:50 pm
I think Brookmyre had an agenda with his villains this time. Brits find our fundamentalists scary and bizarre, don’t forget. Most of his villains are a bit over the top, but most of them are politicians (with a bit of religious hypocrisy but nothing like St John).
Posted by the chaplain on March 16, 2008 at 7:07 pm
Ridger said: “Brits find our fundamentalists scary and bizarre, don’t forget.”
Truth be told, I find our fundamentalists scary and bizarre, even though at one time I agreed with some – just a few, not many - of their positions.
A number of my still-Christian friends and family members find them scary and bizarre too.
Notwithstanding Brookmyre’s agenda, which was obvious and is clearly excusable, those characters should have been drawn a bit more sympathetically. I don’t like neon lights or black&white hats that tell me which characters I’m supposed to like and agree with. I like empathizing with the bad guys, at least a little bit.
Even though I panned the book pretty badly, I’ve read far worse. At least Brookmyre is funnier than Ludlum (who keeps writing the same story over and over and selling millions of copies every time – I really don’t get how he does that).