Customer Reviews

Godless

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First, I loved the characters. It was great to hang out with them. Second, I loved what it was about. Godless shows you how a religion could come to be--how it could actually be created.

Pete Hautman always takes on big issues in his books: Sweetblood--vampires and diabetes, Mr. Was--abuse and time travel, Stone Cold--gambling. In this new book, he decides to take on a huge issue--what and how we believe God to be.

Godless is serious and funny at the same time, at the same moment. You can be laughing about what a character is saying and yet it can be painful and true.

How often is it you find a book for young adults that objectively discusses things like agnosticism and faith? The answer is not often and that is perhaps one reason Pete Hautman's Godless won the the 2004 National Book Award for Young People's Literature. Another reason is more straightforward -- it's well written, particularly for its target audience.

Godless tells the story of 16-year-old Jason Bock. Bock is the imaginative type and is beginning to doubt his Catholic faith. In part because he is toying with his religious youth group, Jason concocts his own religion. Its god is the town's 207-foot water tower. After all, Jason reasons, "Water is Life." Coming up with much of its doctrine off the top of his head, Jason names it Chutengodianism, the Church of the Ten-legged God.

Jason's best friend, Peter "Shin" Shinner, is there from the outset. As the religion's Head Kahuna, Jason names Shin First Keeper of the Sacred Text. Shin even begins writing Chutengodianism's scripture, excerpts of which preface each chapter. Most subsequent members of the religion also are granted a title, although their admission to the religion often is based as much on ulterior motives as their expressing an interest in joining, which is equally likely to be for a lark. For example, Jason's attraction to pretty Magda Price leads him to name her High Priestess and bully Henry Stagg becomes High Priest because he knows how to climb to the top of the water tower.

As far-fetched as it may seem, Hautman pulls off most of it. While you could nitpick about how Henry's character vacillates between bully and buddy and Shin's total infatuation with the made-up cult, what makes Godless so worthwhile is that it is neither pro-religion nor anti-religion. That fact may make a few evangelicals and book-banners howl if it ends up in a school library or curriculum. Yet the book reveals the ramifications inherent with virtually any religion or faith. We see the ease with which some people will join something that gives them a feeling they fit in a bit better. We see those who go off the deep end and become zealots. We see those who are swayed by personality. We see schisms in leadership and doctrine. We see there are consequences to actions taken on the basis of presumed faith alone.

Unlike what one might assume from the title, Godless is not a critique of whether a supreme being exists or a broadside on any religion. Granted, Jason does have some issues with and criticisms of Catholicism and its rites. Still, that largely serves to frame the context. The book's overall tone makes even that part of the exploration in which anyone confronting a question of faith might engage. Godless actually allows young adults -- or anyone -- to think about such issues without advocating any one position and in a context relatively unhindered by the ardor or emotions that tend to accompany most discussions of this sort if a particular religion or faith is involved.

In a brilliantly authored book for young adults, Schmidt introduces a basic American Concept. Freedom of religion! The right is protected, but for one young man it is not being honored.

As an atheist, the protagonist holds the view that all religion was "all made up." So, he decides to invent his own. It does not matter that the object of their religious fervor is a water tower. It is specifically chosen because it is so unGodlike.

Yet, the story develops as all religious stories develop; with a concept, and a following. Jason does build a small following for his religion, yet it gets him virtually nothing but trouble. Yet he insists on going forward, despite the pressure from those who are not interested in his creation of a new religion.

Perhaps one of the most interesting characters of all is Shin. Shin, a close friend of Jason, becomes enamoured with the religion to the point that he starts writing a gospel of the religion. He actually hears the water tower speak to him and has recorded it. He has many, many pages of the gospel of the new religion transcribed, as he says, the "Tower speaks to me, I hear it inside my head."

Yet through all the troubles and travails, there is a persistence that Jason displays and in his mind; and the minds of most of his followers, he has prevailed. Even if it has to be sub rosa, as those around do not accept even the discussion of the topic, it is still his rite. He is still entitled to do it, in America.

The book is highly recommended for all people over the age of 13. It is especially illustrative of a phenomenon repeated all over the world many times. The book cites Joseph Smith's Church of Latter Day Saints and L. Ron Hubbard's Church of Scientology, but does not dwell at all on their philosophies, just mentions them as new religions. And in how many places aside from America, are citizens free to do this? Not many at all.

This book will change the way you think. It's a good story, with characters I swear I know, and the main guy is too believable for words. He's funny, he's serious, he's smart, and he's not smart. Just like that guy that sits next to you in (fill in the blank). He's got questions about people telling him what to believe--he wants to figure it out for himself--and conquering his fear helps him do that. I never knew what would happen next. I've told all my friends to read it.

15-year-old Jason Bock and his friend Peter Stephen Schinner (AKA Shin) are scrounging around the town's water tower when Henry Stagg shows up with his fists and an attitude. That single event, combined with Jason's antagonism toward his parents Catholic religion, leads Jason and Shin to create their own religion. The Ten-Legged One watches over the town, pumping life through the piped veins of the city, so why not worship the life giver?

Why mess around with Catholicism when you can have your own customized religion? All you need is a disciple or two. And a god.

Cleverly dispersed throughout the opening pages of the chapters, the myth of The Ocean and the secrets of their religion grow and mutate. Chutengodianism is born and spreads. Friends join. Sides are drawn. The water tower becomes the focus of their lives, the center of their adventures, the bane of their existence.

Resonating with the spirit of great works like Orwell's ANIMAL FARM, Hautman's ludicrous tale raises important questions about religion. Who or what defines religion? Is religion a good thing? And what happens when religion is taken too far?

After all, people shouldn't make such a big deal out of it. It's just a religion. Right?

-- Reviewed by Jonathan Stephens

The first Pete Hautman book I read was THE MORTAL NUTS. It was one in a series of offbeat mysteries, featuring Joe Crow, a former cocaine addict and reluctant P.I. It was set at the Minnesota State Fair. I loved it. After reading most of the others in the series, plus a few more literary efforts, I was dismayed to find Hautman had abandoned the humorous/mystery market for the young adult novel. I was even more surprised to find he'd won the National Book Award for one of them.

Anyway I thought I'd read GODLESS to see if the irreverent humor I loved so much translated to a new genre. I'm of two minds. I absolutely love the idea. Just about every intelligent kid questions his religion at one time or another, so there's certainly grist for the mill. It's just that these characters didn't come alive for me like Axel and his friends in Mortal Nuts (a poker term, meaning you've got an unbeatable hand). Some of them are way over the top.

In response to his father's steadfast belief in the Catholic church, Jason Bock creates his own, the Chutengodians, who worship the town water tower. Jason sees himself as an agnostic moving towards becoming an atheist, and he's trying to show that his new, made-up religion is no more outlandish than some of the others. But soon the idea gets out of hand and some of his followers take the whole thing seriously. In other words, Hautman has written sort of a young adult satire, which may have appealed to the National Book Award voters.

The plot isn't much. They climb the tower and swim around in it. They get caught. Jason spends time in jail. The two characters who take things to extremes are Henry Stagg and Peter "Shin" Schinner. Stagg, a little bully who loves science fiction, soon splits off from the main group and forms his own religion (sound familiar?). Shin, a cerebral fellow with an unhealthy attachment to gastropods (snails), becomes a Chutengodian zealot, going so far as to write his own Genesis (used as chapter headings).

(...)

Godless was a great book about a boy named Jason Bock and his summer vacation he spent with his friends. In the first chapter of the book you come on to three characters: the main character Jason but also his best friend Shin (Peter Stephen Schinner). Henry is a boy who likes to always make trouble, he is the kid that there always is in a story that grew up in a bad environment and loves to pick fights. But shin on the other hand is totally different, he is very quiet and shy, and when ever he gets mad or embarrassed he does what the author explained as "going into his shell" and wouldn't talk or anything. In the first scene of the book you find three of the biggest characters in the biggest seen in the books, but for now Jason and shin are searching for snails in this place under the water tower. When henry comes around and punches Jason in the gut.

This book is strongly based on Jason and his religion and how he takes it to a whole new level. But it starts out about his Christian religion and how he doesn't believe in god, so he makes up his own beliefs and even his own religion known as "the Chutengodians" and worship the water tower in the center of the town known as " the ten legged one".

His two other friends in the book are cute as a button Magda Price and Dan Grant that normal nothing-special friend that every one has. But as this religion gets bigger so does the danger. Especially at the first meeting when they plan to climb to the top of the tower.

There is a reason that GODLESS won the National Book Award for Young People's Literature, and I don't believe it's because author Pete Hautman wrote a book he intended to be satire, as other reviews have suggested. To me, GODLESS is the epitome of everything that is both bad and good about organized religion--it is, in effect, an entreaty to the leaders of religions around the world to look at how blind faith funds their coffers.

Yes, maybe I'm reading more into the book than the author intended. If so, I can only hope that he appreciates the fact that I've obviously thought about the words he wrote long after they were published, and that he'd be happy about that fact. Now, though, on to the story...

Fifteen-year old Jason Bock is an agnostic ("I'll believe in God when I see Him") bordering on being an atheist ("There is no God"). His mother is obsessed over his health, coming up weekly with a new ailment that he just has to be suffering from. His father, though, is more concerned with his son's soul. That's why Jason, regardless of his personal beliefs, finds himself attending weekly Sunday Mass at the Church of the Good Shepherd, and even occasionally joins in at Thursday night TPO (Teen Power Outreach) meetings. The fact that he's ordered to attend the meetings more frequently when he's in trouble doesn't escape his notice.

Until one day, agnostic slash atheist Jason wonders what would happen if he started his own religion. Along with his best friend, Shin, fellow TPO attendee Magda, preacher's son Dan, and town rebel Henry, Jason creates the Chutengodians, a religion who worships the Ten-Legged One. That the Ten-Legged One is the town's water tower doesn't seem to deter them.

I know what you're thinking--who in their right mind would worship a water tower, even if they are teenagers? The answer, of course, is pretty simple. Why do people worship the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost? Why are there Buddhists, Muslims, Scientologists, Mormons, Protestants, or Latter Day Saints? Why does anyone worship anything? They do it because someone came up with their own ideas, made up some rules, implemented some commandments, created posts of leadership, and recruited parishioners.

Jason does the same, with some of the same consequences other organized religions have faced over the centuries--infighting, backstabbing, persecution, and doubts. When one Chutengodian almost ends up dead in an accident, and another seems determined to take his own life, and the others doubt the wisdom of associating with the creator of their religion, things start to fall apart. Sounds to me a lot like what happens in most "normal" organized religions found throughout the world today.

GODLESS is, without a doubt, one of the most thought-provoking books I've ever read. I highly recommend it to anyone searching for their own truths, regarding not only religion but finding your sense of self. You won't be disappointed--I know I wasn't.

I'm an adult and read this book awhile ago, but still think about it. The characters are interesting, but the best part of the book is the IDEA that a religion can be created, marketed, and that people will follow. It explores how "belief" can become a "religion"? And who did write the gospels? Religion happens in our country with the "big" religions and cults that crop up yearly. The book's direct and indirect look at religion and god and what is "valid" is all quite interesting. I wonder if teens actually understand the deeper ideas.

This book is about a boy, Jason, who on a whim starts his own religion worshipping a new god - the town's water tower. Other kids join this religion for different reasons, with different levels of commitment. Jason struggles to keep the religion pure and the townspeople and their parents start to be aware of what the kids are doing.

Jason is very bright, and he has some interesting points about religion to make. As time goes by, he feels like he's lost control of his creation and that bothers him. If you've ever thought that all religions were stupid, this is a book you should read. It does NOT take a position of being either for or against ANY religion. It does examine why different people want something in their life, and the reasons why they want a religion to fill that need.

This would be a good book for a bright kid who is starting to think about religion in general - it may help them clarify their own opinions and thoughts.