Customer Reviews

Life After God

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3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I was only recent introduced to Douglas Coupland by a pal of mine who pestered me for months to try his books. Now I'm glad she did. "Life After God" has a somewhat experimental feel to the narrative, but it's a successful experiment if it is.

Coupland explores the concept: "You are the first generation raised without religion." Or more specifically, how human beings (all of which are born with a drive to believe in something -- religion, politics, art) respond to the material-driven world. Meditations on what separates humans from animals, imagining a nuclear explosion and how it would immediately impact the people who die in it, a philosophical bout with depression, and how people respond to their "lives after God."

Disregard the initially off-putting title of the book, because that title really doesn't reflect what the book is about. At the end of one short story, the narrator concludes, "My secret is that I need God." Not the way religious fanatic Dana does, which is more needy and superficial, but rather in a deep and primal way. And Coupland doesn't go overboard trying to explain it to the readers -- he just writes it and lets it sink in.

It has a slightly odd format; the pages are tiny, and the parts of each short story are more like connected vignettes, some only a few sentences long. And it's sprinkled with cute little drawings, like Coupland doodled on his manuscript. (Rain, boxes, computers, matches, and a parakeet with a key in its beak, among others) As in Coupland's other books, there is a sort of unhappy optimism to these stories, and Coupland's musings about how a lack of emphasized God has affected our ability to love and believe.

"Life After God" is not exactly an ordinary book. But it touches very well on hard-to-write-about topics and its messages lingered for a long time in my mind.

"Life After God" is a genuinely morose, sad, melancholic collection of stories dealing with loneliness, isolation and unhappiness. Most of its characters are numbly horrified by where they find themselves in life.

The stories here deal with that in-between world of the childishness of youth and the maturity of adulthood -- and how the people existing in that world make the transition. Some simply take the step, while others -- the people here -- can't help but pause and reflect, to question it, to wonder if it's even sensible.

Coupland's premise seems to be that this young generation of the '90s, so deadened by irony, so empty and unfeeling, experience this crushing loneliness because they are without religion (which is something I don't agree with, since I side with Marx and think of religion as nothing more than an opiate).

Coupland does understand his characters, though, and as someone who's just a bit younger, I identified with them (even when I found them pretentious and dramatic). There are times when I felt like Coupland was stealing my thoughts. Showing me conversations I've had about the worries and insecurities in my life.

The greatest thing about "Life After God" are the staggering and utterly true thoughts Coupland drops here and there, which are so perfectly accurate, they leave you gut-punched.

I probably enjoyed the final two stories the least, and "In The Desert" the most, but "Life After God" is an excellent story collection that displays Coupland's considerable talent.

This splendidly written book captivates the reader with compassion for the main character as he stumbles through the mistakes and beauty he has created in his life. The book follows the journey of a person who is trying to discover who he is in the midst of a fallen world, void spirituality and broken dreams. I'm a huge fan of the author, Douglas Coupland, and I feel that this is by far his best work. It will make you laugh, cry and ponder this crazy thing we call existence.

Two things stuck with me from the book Fight Club: (1) the line "Your father is your model for God" and (2) I wish I'd read it before I visited Blarney Castle.

The reason I bring up "Fight Club" is that "Life After God" posits "You are the first generation raised without religion," and "Fight Club" says men today are a generation raised by our mothers. So, I guess the problem boils down to "Where's Poppa?"

My friend Todd loaned me this book after I graduated college. I felt really hollow then, like a robot that required pop-culture and irony to survive. All the characters in "Life After God" feel hollow, and it was comforting to read about them. I felt less alone afterward, and somehow the book gave me hope for a better future, even though it features a story about the apocalypse.

I guess the key thing is that the book sparked me to feel again, shaking up some long dormant emotions. It's a quick read that I usually recommend to depressed friends.

About 8 years ago I spent the night at a friend's house one night and had severe insomnia, so I picked up this book from her bookshelf and started reading it. I had never even heard of Douglas Coupland before. The book was so good that I read it the whole way through that night. It's very intense and hit me at a difficult time in my life. It was like reading the Bible- manna to my soul. I have gone on to read every Coupland book I could find, and they are all touching and engaging. I even met him at a book signing here in DC. He's not how I imagined him- he's very unassuming. Anyway, this book is great, just like all of his.

Forget the more famous "Generation X." The collection "Life After God" is Coupland's best work by far. This collection of stories is related by theme and narrative voice; while the characters change from story to story, the point of view remains the same, and Coupland uses the same narrative voice throughout. And what a voice it is! Funny, Perceptive, Sad, resigned to the past yet yearning for a better future--a future which the author fears might always elude him. The characters in "Life After God" are more like real people than the characters in his other books, who often assume the roles of cultural stereotypes and morph into cliches. In different ways, the characters in "Life After God" are all dealing with loss--the loss of a lover, of a sister, a childhood friend, one's own idealism. And there are no happy endings. At best the characters manage to accept their losses and find a sliver of hope to carry them through the rest of their lives. Coupland's prose is lean and poetic; his eye for detail manages to convey much about a character or a situation through the use of one or two objects. His monotone prose reflects the flat, wounded states of his characters' souls. Each of these stories is heartbreaking in its own way. Despite his reputation as a novelist, short fiction seems to be Coupland's natural medium. His storytelling talents are average at best, but his observations of character and feeling are superb. It is the latter which makes "Life After God" such a moving experience.

This book, like most by Douglas Coupland, is a fast-paced, easy read. The book that I read was very compact (more wallet-sized than like a book) and hard-back, so its small pages passed by in a flash of wonder and amazement.

In a collection of six poignant short stories filled with colorful and full characters, Coupland addresses issues that affects us all: bravely looking at death, change, the passage of life; wondering who you are or waking up to suddenly realize that you don't know where you're going, or that you don't like who you are.

Despite the atheistic title, the characters all are in search of God, and toward the end one of his characters admits that he "needs" God, but can't seem to allow that secret to come out. But how can we find any reality in the world of fast-moving cars, of freedom of movement and blindingly fast change, of religious fanatics, televangelists, a world tempered by drugs and a search for meaning, any meaning?

Coupland's answer comes out in the beauty of nature and the wonder of our relationships with the people around us. Although his characters can't relate to the Jesus-lovers of organized religion, they are all reaching out for something bigger than themselves, something that "the first Generation raised without Religion" has a difficulty grasping.

I have long felt that Douglas Coupland and his insights are perhaps the closest that popular culture gets to Truth spelled out on paper. This book has all the profundity and all the questions of his preceding books, in a very unassuming and readable manner. Pick it up: you'll read it in a single afternoon.

i read LIFE AFTER GOD when it was first published and was simply floored. here was an author whose voice spoke to me and my generation. coupland's simple yet poignant prose captured the feelings of ambiguity and confusion that many of us were feeling. the stories in this collection may seem simpleton on the exterior, but they are much more than what meets the eye. think the greatness of ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT by erich remarque. its complexity lays in its very simplicity.

i was still in college when i first picked up the book. i recently picked it up again. the effects were still the same. what's remarkable about LIFE AFTER GOD is the sheer optimism one feels after finishing it. coupland doesn't claim to know all the answers or to grant inner peace, but what he does do is allow the reader to intensely reflect on his/her own beliefs.

All I can say is that it's one of those books that makes you realize you're not alone. The whole time I found myself going "YES!! Exactly!!" It just makes sense.

An excellent read for anyone who has ever questioned ... well ... anything.

This is one of those books that I have wanted to review for a while, but was unsure of how to approach it. I love the book and have read it over a half dozen times in less than two years. Yet it is such an atypical book that it is difficult to review. I can just be blunt and state that the book will grab you and draw you back in again and again.

The book is published as fiction, yet rumors have it that Coupland will admit that it is at least partially autobiographical. It is a collection of recollections, thoughts, memories and drawings by Coupland. It is the recount a man's life, and as we find out he is telling the story to find out how his life got to where it is. He wants a record for his daughter so that maybe she will understand him better. My favorite of the individual entries is:

"Now -- here is my secret:
I tell it to you with an openness of heart I doubt I shall ever achieve again, so I pray that you are in a quiet room as you hear these words. My secret is that I need God - that I am sick and can no longer make it alone. I need God to help me give, because I no longer seem capable of giving; to help me to be kind, as I no longer seem capable of kindness; to help me love, as I seem beyond able to love." p.359

Every time I pick up this book, I get something more out of it. Sometimes I read it from beginning to end, and then at other times I just pick it up and read at random. This book deals with many of the 'big' questions all of us will have to deal with in our lives. Questions like: How do we deal with Loneliness? Anxiety? Failed relationships? How can we find quiet in our lives? It also deals with the question of being raised without a religion or belief system and how, as we age, we end up struggling with spiritual questions.

If you can track down the first edition hardcover it is worth it. It is in a different format and shape. With the dust jacket off, it looks like a prayer book or bible. If you read it without the jacket in public places people will often ask you what you are reading. This was intentional and the shape and design of this book are part of the art of the book, and part of the complexity Coupland has woven into it. The front cover of the hardback also has an outline of a hand, like a tracing of a child's hand. As we are all reaching out beyond ourselves in search of some greater meaning in life, we are reaching out like a child in search of a parent.

My hat is off to Coupland and this amazing work of art - on all the levels that it is art of the deepest level. Coupland has created a masterpiece that will become a classic, which will survive through the ages.