Book Review: Book of Air and Shadows

When I spied a gently worn copy of Michael Gruber’s The Book of Air and Shadows sitting on my mother’s bookshelf, I was giddy. I had spied the book quite a few times at work and had seriously considered picking it up. Happening to find it by chance (and for free!) seemed like a sign like this was a book meant to be read.
Now that I have read it, I am not so sure.
I am not here to say that the book was bad. On the contrary, it had all the trappings of a wonderful novel. A secret Shakespeare manuscript, a dastardly plot, the greatest literary find in history, and a nice smattering of reviews that lauded it as “better than the DaVinci Code”.
The Shakespeare aspect of it was the biggest draw for me, appealing to my literature degree and the fact that 16th and 17th century British literature happens to be my favorite period of literature. Yes, I very much heart the Bard, and I love a good thriller. So it was with great anticipation that I sat down with the book and opened to the first page.
The plot is marvelous. A man named Richard Bracegirdle (which is a Tolkien name! It was the family name of some of the hobbits that lived in the Shire. Again, appealing to my nerdiness) was caught up in a plot to expose Shakespeare as a papist, a Catholic supporter in the time of James Stuart when the Protestant religion was the “One, True Religion”. The entire basis of the story is driven by letters Bracegirdle wrote in the early 1600s, discovered in the backs of old books damaged in a fire. (A very cool point on this is that Gruber actually uses the correct 17th century spelling, where “gonnes” is used instead of “guns”. This was something that was quite delightful to me.) He convinces Shakespeare that a his lord wants the Bard to write a play exonerating Mary, Queen of Scotland (also known to history as “Bloody Mary”) that will infuriate the people of England and, hopefully, keep the heir of England from marrying a Catholic Spanish princess.
The found letters send two modern-day men --- Jake Mishkin and Albert Crosetti --- on a mission to find the lost manuscript and rewrite Shakespearean history as we know it. This serch takes them from New York to England and back again. Along the way they encounter beautiful women, Russian gangsters, and a bevy of other colorful characters (including Jake’s brother Paul, a Jesuit priest with a storied past and some interesting connections).
As I stated earlier, this book has all the elements of a great novel. Like the DaVinci Code, it’s the reimagining of something that we have been taught about since we were small schoolchildren that really draws you to it. And it contains a nice conspiracy theory full of mobsters and professors alike who will do at nothing to get their hands on this manuscript.
But that is where the similarities with Dan Brown’s novel ends. When I read the DaVinci Code, I was up until two a.m., unable to put it down. It gripped me from the beginning and held on all the way to the end. The Book of Air and Shadows didn’t really pick up until the last fourth of the novel. When Jake and Al finally meet, and there is the spectacular gunfight in the Crosetti home, I wanted to keep reading. Before then, it had been a chapter here and a chapter there, and maybe this will pick up soon and I can get through this book. And the conspiracy theory is , well, lame is a kind word for it, really.
Also, the characters are kind of weak. While Crosetti is funny and believable and great to read, Jake is just… There’s really nothing about him that makes you care. He’s just a pathetic asshole. Gruber writes Jake’s first person narratives in a way that seems like he wants you to feel sorry for him, but I can’t. He’s not the type of asshole that you say ‘Okay, he’s a jerk, but you have to feel sorry for him’ in a Frank Castle sort of way. He honestly has no attributes that make you feel sorry for him, but you don’t completely hate him either. He’s just a pathetic man that you really can’t find a reason to care about.
The writing style of this book is amazing, it really is. And I am substantially impressed by the fact that Gruber is a marine biologist who has a much better writing style than many ‘writers’ I know. This book’s biggest downfall --- and it’s ultimate defeat --- is how disjointed everything it. You have three different accounts --- the Bracegirdle letters, Jake’s first person account, and Crosetti’s third person views --- that really just don’t jive. When the two men finally meet very late in the book, and you are getting two sides of the same events, it makes it flow much more smoothly. (For an excellent demonstration of writing a book told totally in first person from multiple sources, check out Elizabeth Kostava’s The Historian. It is easily one of the best books I have ever read.) This disjointed writing also accounts for the many, many questions that just aren’t quite answered, or answered in a way that makes you scratch your head. Is the manuscript real? It must have been. Then why did he add the little bit about it being a fake? What reason did he have for throwing Jake’s father into the mix? It really made no sense. Did Gruber really expect his readers not to figure out that Mickey was involved? And that Carolyn and Miranda were the same person?
In the long run, the book was disappointing. Not bad, just not quite what I had expected or hope. But I wouldn’t mind picking up some of Gruber’s other works. I rather hope that he took the mistakes he made with this novel and made sure to correct them later on.

Book Review: The Shack

So I resisted for quite a long time reading this book. All I heard was "God" blah blah blah "religion" blah blah blah. Now, while I have no problem with books abut God and religion, when they're THIS popular, they're usually the type of books that only those really hardcore fanatics like. But when someone came in to return the book because, and I quote, "God is not a large, black woman", I knew this might be something I should check out. I sniffed around a bit, read an excerpt online, didn't think I'd like it, let someone co-workers talk me into it, and sat down to read it.
It was soooooo slow. Like, I just stopped reading for awhile and read a whole other book. (You can check out my review for that book, Dave Cullen's "Columbine" on an earlier post.) Then I finally picked it back and up and forced myself to continue reading.
I must admit, I was pleasantly surprised. While I am not religious, I do enjoy studying theology. And this book is very theological and not very religious. For example, Mack, the main character, marvels at the fact that none of the three --- Papa (God), Jesus, and Sarayu (the Holy Spirirt) --- are white. That made me happy. And, of course, God is indeed a large, black woman. Jesus does not believe in the institution of religion, another brownie point int my eyes, nor does he want to turn people into Christians. As he points out to Mack, he himself is not Christian.
There are many points throughout the book that made me quite happy to see. But there was one little gem that I just couldn't stop beaming about.
In his journey towards healing, Mack encounters a character known as Sophia, a woman who is described as the embodiment of God's wisdom. Now, I don't know how many of you have studied other facets of religion, but Sophia as wisdom is not a new concept.
The Gnostics, an ancient, religious sect that are supposedly responsible for a vast number of the books in the Apocrapha, held a slight different belief than Christians about the order of creation. In their tradition, God was created by another being: Sophie (or Sophia), who was wisdom. And seeing the character of Sophia play the role of wisdom in this book just made me delieriously happy.
Unfortunatly, the book was rather a long bore, with only a few good things sprinkled throughout. For the most part, it was the writing that killed me. I know, I know. I've had a bit more experience in what is supposed to be good writing than most people. So I tend to judge books a bit harder. But honestly! When was the last time this guy had a grammer class? And who on earth edited this thing?? No one seemed to have checked it for readablity. I guess they were too excited about having a religious piece of fiction to make sure it was well-written.
Another big turn-off was the way he had Papa, Jesus and Sarayu explain things. Some of it was great and wonderful and made perfect sense. But it seemed as though a vast majority of it was simply a rehash of another question that had already been asked pages before, just with another --- although equally as confusing --- way to answer. A good portion of the time I had to re-read entire pages, and still felt just like Mack, whose favorite saying was "Huh?"
In simple terms, the book had a great idea. It was probably one of the most original books I have read in a long time. And the parts of it that I did understand were great. While it doesn't want to make me run out and join the local church, it did help me have a better Scriptural understanding of God. But the execution was very, very poor. Will I read it again? Probably not. Will I recommend it? Only to people who have an open religious mind. But hey. Any book that portrays God as a large, black woman is, without a doubt, something worth looking into, if only for the novelty of it.