Customer Reviews

The Snake Oil Wars or Scheherazade Ginsberg Strikes Again

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A whirlwind tour of heaven and hell, or Topside and Below Stairs, as it's referred to in the book. When God/TheDevil/An Alien is put on trial, the author managed to humorously skewer the religous right, the hippies, yuppies, the middle class, and every major religious character out there. Fun stuff.

REVIEW OF "THE SNAKE OIL WARS"

Author: PARKE GODWIN, 1989

Submitted by Sandy Buckingham, Daytona Beach, Florida (1998)

Though THE SNAKE OIL WARS was written almost 10 years ago, it is most apropos to this age of burgeoning religiosity in American politics, bombings and killings by Christian fanatics and more and more breaches in laws and principles that would protect our rights to privacy and freedom of choice. SNAKE OIL WARS astounds by being a satire on America's Puritanical decade of the 90's, written prior to the fact. Is this prophecy or what?

No, this is hardly prophecy, for the author takes us on a whirlwind tour of the history of religious fanaticism, and especially the historical foundations of what we now call the "Christian Right" movement. He then shows the logical conclusion of the movement: a fascist theocracy in which science, technology and medicine is subject to "snake oil salesmen" and in which the poor and those less fortunate than ourselves are scorned just because they do not seem to show the "visible signs of God's favor".

This is "must" reading for anyone who wants to know the basic principles behind why Americans increasingly are losing their privacy rights, why freedom of choice is being made to sound like a dirty word, and what the real agenda of the "Christian Right" is.

It is also "must" reading for anyone in the "Christian Right" movement who would like to know the foundation and logical outcome of the movement. Do we really want to live in a country in which our houses and lives are exposed to an "inerrant writ", where the right to privacy is extinguished, and "legal judgment (is made) on the most personal matters"?

In conclusion, I can only quote the erudite author's dedication of the book:

"To those lucid and courageous minds who gave you the Inquisition, the Salem witch trials, Falwell, Robertson and the God-inspired Rule of the Righteous. To those intrepid souls who fight with unflagging zeal to remove from libraries dangerous books they have not read and from theaters those spiritually toxic films they have not seen, believing that thought is a controlled substance and secular thinking hazardous to mental health."

I first read this book and it's prequeal (Waiting for the Galactic Bus) about ten years ago. Since then, I've read it three more times, getting something new each time. The last time I read it, I actually took notes on some of the historical characters - especially the two very important incognito figures. This story has many levels it can be enjoyed on, the most obvious being a comical farce; moving deeper there's a lot of serious philosophy here and a scathing examination of the American ideals of Freedom vs. America's religious revisionists determined to make us a 'Christian Nation'. All in all, an excellent read!

This book and his earlier book have to be among my top tens in terms of science fiction and humour, and yet most people have never heard of these books. Some things strike too close to home, I guess. But do yourself a favor and find these if you can.

I read "Waiting for the Galactic Bus" over a decade ago, and only recently learned of this sequel. The Snake Oil Wars is, in my opinion, better than the first book. It's wry, the plot is rich, the character development isn't overwrought, and the book really makes you think. I enjoy the fact that the two lawyers are shrouded in mystery, although the clues are many - I identified the man known as Joshua Speed almost instantly, but it took me 2/3 of the book to recognize the man working under the name Peter Helm.

The book is also impressively timely, given the current religious duality in America.

Barion, if someone asks you if your are God, don't say yes?

Apparently interfering in planetary evolution is not the done thing, so some of the former's colleagues summon him home for a good old fashioned trial.

This leaves one of them left on Earth to give himself a promotion, and replace himself in the underworld sense with someone not to many people will be happy with, either.

3.5 out of 5