An occasionally overwrought slurry of myth and mysticism that nevertheless addresses dire sociopolitical problems still...
In a follow-up to his autobiographical novel, Where the Bird Sings Best (2015), cult filmmaker, comic-book writer, and novelist Jodorowsky (The Metabaron #1: The Techno-Admiral & The Anti-Baron, 2018, etc.) tells the surreal tale of his Ukrainian Jewish immigrant father, Jaime, and mother, Sara Felicidad, and his Chilean childhood in the wake of the 1929 stock market crash.
When Jaime and Sara’s store in Tocopilla, Chile, is robbed by a man claiming to be Jesus Christ, the couple, expecting a child, migrate to the copper mines of Chuquicamata in search of a better livelihood. On the way, they meet Rubí Grugenstein, the granddaughter of the copper mine’s American owner. Rubí quickly becomes appalled by the violent exploitation of workers and land. Her solution is to have a miner impregnate her, build a statue of a copper goddess, and, in a public ceremony merging Incan and Catholic iconography, toss herself and the statue into the mines. The revolution she hopes to incite with her suicide is swiftly crushed. Jaime and Sara return home to have twins: Raquel Lea and Alejandro. Soon after, Jaime embarks on a quest to assassinate Chile’s dictator, while Raquel Lea, spouting an impossible stream of nonsensical poetry, is sent away to her grandparents, who silence her with sweetened rice. Meanwhile, warring Communists and Trotskyists take advantage of Sara’s generosity, and the police torture her for her involvement with them. The spirit of The Rabbi, who haunted Jaime’s father and Jaime, now mentors young Alejandro, guiding him through a series of absurd ceremonies that heal the long-separated family after they reunite. Throughout these epic, farcical travails, the narrative repeatedly dwells on genitalia and their “effluvia,” among other sophomoric obsessions with bodily functions.
An occasionally overwrought slurry of myth and mysticism that nevertheless addresses dire sociopolitical problems still painfully relevant today.Pub Date: Oct. 23, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-63206-053-2
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Restless Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
An illuminating read for anyone interested in the inner workings of the Catholic Church; for prelate-fiction superfans, it...
Harris, creator of grand, symphonic thrillers from Fatherland (1992) to An Officer and a Spy (2014), scores with a chamber piece of a novel set in the Vatican in the days after a fictional pope dies.
Fictional, yes, but the nameless pontiff has a lot in common with our own Francis: he’s famously humble, shunning the lavish Apostolic Palace for a small apartment, and he is committed to leading a church that engages with the world and its problems. In the aftermath of his sudden death, rumors circulate about the pope’s intention to fire certain cardinals. At the center of the action is Cardinal Lomeli, Dean of the College of Cardinals, whose job it is to manage the conclave that will elect a new pope. He believes it is also his duty to uncover what the pope knew before he died because some of the cardinals in question are in the running to succeed him. “In the running” is an apt phrase because, as described by Harris, the papal conclave is the ultimate political backroom—albeit a room, the Sistine Chapel, covered with Michelangelo frescoes. Vying for the papal crown are an African cardinal whom many want to see as the first black pope, a press-savvy Canadian, an Italian arch-conservative (think Cardinal Scalia), and an Italian liberal who wants to continue the late pope’s campaign to modernize the church. The novel glories in the ancient rituals that constitute the election process while still grounding that process in the real world: the Sistine Chapel is fitted with jamming devices to thwart electronic eavesdropping, and the pressure to act quickly is increased because “rumours that the pope is dead are already trending on social media.”
An illuminating read for anyone interested in the inner workings of the Catholic Church; for prelate-fiction superfans, it is pure temptation.Pub Date: Nov. 22, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-451-49344-6
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 6, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2016
These letters from some important executive Down Below, to one of the junior devils here on earth, whose job is to corrupt mortals, are witty and written in a breezy style seldom found in religious literature. The author quotes Luther, who said: "The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn." This the author does most successfully, for by presenting some of our modern and not-so-modern beliefs as emanating from the devil's headquarters, he succeeds in making his reader feel like an ass for ever having believed in such ideas. This kind of presentation gives the author a tremendous advantage over the reader, however, for the more timid reader may feel a sense of guilt after putting down this book. It is a clever book, and for the clever reader, rather than the too-earnest soul.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1942
ISBN: 0060652934
Page Count: 53
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1943
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