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God Is Dead by Ron Currie
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God Is Dead (edition 2008)

by Ron Currie (Author)

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingMentions
4261858,435 (3.62)13
Best stories: ""The Bridge", Indian Summer" and "Interview With..." being the stand-outs.

I've been a fanboy of Currie Jr. since Everything Matters!, but had not read his debut until today. I wolfed this down over the course of one day up in Whistler. The imagery is powerful, the prose realistic and (mostly) steady through the interweaving stories. It's a solid read but feels like he's still searching for his voice. At times the scenes are scorching with intensity to the point of absurdity. A solid read but I will continue to point people to EM! as the place to start with his work. ( )
  Cail_Judy | Apr 21, 2020 |
Showing 18 of 18
I liked what was basically being attempted here - slowly unveiling a radically changed world through the experiences of individual lives - but the poorly judged and racist tone of the first story ruined the experience of the rest of the book. ( )
  captainsunbeam | Apr 5, 2021 |
Best stories: ""The Bridge", Indian Summer" and "Interview With..." being the stand-outs.

I've been a fanboy of Currie Jr. since Everything Matters!, but had not read his debut until today. I wolfed this down over the course of one day up in Whistler. The imagery is powerful, the prose realistic and (mostly) steady through the interweaving stories. It's a solid read but feels like he's still searching for his voice. At times the scenes are scorching with intensity to the point of absurdity. A solid read but I will continue to point people to EM! as the place to start with his work. ( )
  Cail_Judy | Apr 21, 2020 |
There were some things about this book I really liked. There were thought provoking ideas of a so-so post apocalyptic future that was refreshing and more psychological than just everything blowing up and everyone becoming some sort of Davy Crockett survivalist. When he gets crazy, he really allows himself to go there and I liked that, too. I think Ron Currie, Jr. is smart and I will read more of his work. ( )
  Marssie | Mar 2, 2014 |
Simply put, this was an amazing book. I loved it. Other people should read it. Yes, I mean you. ( )
  diovival | Oct 14, 2013 |
fascinating, grim, funny and hard to forget. One of the best short story collections masquerading as a novel I have read. Not every piece is perfect on its own, but as an arc they manage to create a post-God world that is real and frightening without resorting to the same dystopian nonsense we've seen before. A great companion piece to Coupland's Life After God, but more powerful. ( )
  evanroskos | Mar 30, 2013 |
I bought this book at Christmas time, and I very nearly put it back on the shelf because the cover appalled me. It features a dog sitting outside a cage. Inside the cage is another dog, curled up in a miserable little pile. I couldn’t tell if the caged dog was dead or asleep and not knowing made it worse. In fact, just thinking about the picture is making my stomach hurt a little. I cannot abide it when bad things happen to animals. This reaction taints a lot of my interaction with the world. I bought a Jack Ketchum book knowing full well the plot begins with the death of a dog and even so, I had to stop reading it. I just couldn’t take it. I hope Rugero Deodato, if there is an afterlife, spends a few years getting smacked around by a very large turtle and a couple of very angry pigs. So of course, given this tender-hearted tendency of mine coupled with my perverse desire to torture myself, I had to buy this book that featured a potentially dead dog on the cover being mourned by one of his own.

My instincts were right. This book was going to break my heart and I knew it before I opened it. The plot of this book is a cliche, a hackneyed conversation every wine-cooler and cheap beer-filled college freshman has had: what would happen if God died? But despite the fact that the premise is not original, this book is surprisingly fresh and frightening, at turns tender and sickening, hopeful and horrible. While there were elements that did not work as well as others, the fearlessness in which Currie approaches this story allows me to overlook its weaker parts. Read my entire discussion here: http://ireadoddbooks.com/god-is-dead-by-ron-currie-jr/ ( )
  oddbooks | Jul 27, 2011 |
This is a strange book of interconnected short stories. The first tale describes God taking human form as a refugee in Darfur and his death when the human body is killed. The rest of the stories answer some questions, such as how the world finds out God is dead, and describe how humanity reacts (quite poorly) and then how civilization recovers and what form it takes. Not a pretty picture. There's a very funny portrayal of Colin Powell, and a priceless one-sided interview with the lone survivor of the feral dogs who ate God's dead body and could then speak and think and feel as a human and had all-encompassing knowledge. Entertaining, interesting, odd. ( )
1 vote auntmarge64 | May 23, 2010 |
God has decided to see the suffering in Darfur for himself, and to do so, he takes on the form of a young Dinka woman, who is caught up in the war. In assuming this form, God has also to take on the mortality and frailties of humans, and is killed in the conflict. When his real identity is uncovered, the news that God is dead spreads throughout the globe, causing civil unrest, anarchy, wars and the breakdown of society.

This book is less a novel, and more a series of vaguely interlinked stories about how the world reacts to God’s death. Certain parts tell what life was like after the initial hysteria following the news died down, but all of the tales tell a story of how ordinary lives were affected.

The writing is imaginative, and the stories which unfold in this tale are disturbing, satirical, ironic and at times very amusing. The author seems to shine a light on human flaws and strengths and shows the sort of behaviour that people will display in times of terror and uncertainty.

The book flowed easily, and although the stories within it are only loosely linked, it never felt disjointed – I realised that I was reading big chunks in almost no time at all.

I would definitely recommend this book, especially to fans of dystopian fiction. ( )
2 vote Ruth72 | Feb 7, 2010 |
An interesting collection of linked stories that begin with the premise that God has come to Earth in human form, in the guise of a young Dinka woman, a refugee from the Janjaweed thugs supported by the Sudan government. The woman/God, named Sora, eventually succumbs to her wounds and dies, and is eaten by wild dogs who soon develop unnatural knowledge, wisdom and the power of voiceless speech. Eventually the rest of the world learns that God has come to Earth and is now dead, and the rest of this strange, often compelling story deals with different aspects of how this knowledge has affected everybody. Well-written and thought-provoking, but not the equal of Currie's later "Everything Matters". ( )
  burnit99 | Jan 7, 2010 |
This is a wonderful book that should be getting more recognition than it has. It's a collection of interrelated short stories detailing what happens after God takes human form and then dies. Each story is amazing and leaves you with a lot to think about. Great concept, great writing, great book! ( )
1 vote Magadri | Dec 12, 2009 |
Good premise... more like a loosely connected tales, with some common themes... some were really good (the first one) and others fell flat... ( )
  ElLCoolJ | Oct 10, 2009 |
An odd little novel, which I suppose could be described as post-apocalyptic. The story begins with the guilt-ridden God wandering through war-torn Sudan in the guise of a young African woman, before being killed by the Janjaweed. When word gets around that God really is dead, all hell breaks loose, with the formerly ultra-conservative Christians in America turning to worship of their own children, mass suicide of nuns and priests, and, once society gets back on its feet, a war between Evolutionary Psychologists and Post-Modern Anthropologists. And Colin Powell makes an appearance at the beginning in what was apparently a misguided attempt by the (white) author to tap into the guilt felt by assimilationist African-Americans, or something. I'm not sure what that had to do with the rest of the book, but whatever.

Anyway, if all of that sounds interesting and potentially amusing (which is what I thought), I hate to say that something goes moderately wrong in the execution. It's not terrible, but it just doesn't really make sense--I don't mean the part where God dies, but everything that follows. I mean, it's amusing to think of the followers of deterministic Evolutionary Psychology warring with the supposedly liberally open-minded PoMo Anthropologists, but I couldn't suspend my disbelief enough to find any sort of real-world implications, and there's very little humor that I could detect in the writing to suggest that it wasn't meant to be taken at least somewhat seriously. I also thought it was a shortcoming of the book that it only looked at the aftermath as it occurred in parts of Africa and particularly the United States. What about the rest of the world? And why did God put himself into such a life-threatening situation anyway? Overall, I would say that God is Dead isn't bad, but it is fairly unsatisfying in its treatment of a really interesting idea and probably would have benefited from some more humor. I wouldn't write Ron Currie off though, and I'll be keeping an eye out for his sophomore effort. ( )
  wunderkind | Jan 18, 2009 |
God comes to Earth in Darfur in the form of a refugee woman, but gets killed, and this changes the world. Lawlessness, panic, and suicide pacts take over for a while - then people now with nothing to do on a Sunday start to worship their children - which leads a to a (further) dumming down of Western civilisation. Meanwhile, factions develop into worldwide war - the Post Modern Anthropologists versus the Evolutionary Psychologists - different sides of the same coin, and of course now God's not there, what was all that fuss about intelligent design about!!! But most people it seems, still need something to hang their faith upon.

The novel does not have a coherent plot, instead it reads as a linked series of episodes each exploring a facet of the impact of God's death on humanity, highlighting all our failings - 'twas ever thus ... Provocative, irreverent, pessimistic, yet poignant in many parts, I found myself trying to place the author on a scale from religious nutter to atheist nutter. I had to conclude that he is probably a fence-sitter who enjoys stirring things up a bit occasionally.

An interesting, well-written and thought-provoking read. ( )
  gaskella | Nov 1, 2008 |
God is Dead is a biting satire about humanity's dependence on faith, following the literal death of God - disguised as a starving and diseased woman caught in the violence of Darfur.

In the absence of religion, people turn to alternate outlets to hang their faith upon. America exaggerates its "cult of the child" status into literally worshipping children. Others take solace in romantic connections, or the talking dogs who ate the flesh of God. A worldwide war has broken out, with philosophical ideologies replacing the traditional conflict of faiths in battle. It's a very grim but thoughtful book, and an excellent read. ( )
  the_awesome_opossum | Jul 20, 2008 |
In the first chapter, somewhere during the Sudanese conflict in Darfur, God assumes the form of a woman armed only with a bottomless sack of sorghum and is killed by the Janjaweed. Subsequent chapters offer glimpses of how the world reacts in the years following God’s demise -- from child worship to child anti-worship, to a bizarre world scenario in which Postmodern Anthropologists and Evolutionary Psychologists are the factions battling it out in World War ?. ( )
  ryner | Feb 11, 2008 |
God is Dead by Ron Currie is a stimulating short first novel from an author whose short stories have attracted attention previously. The basic premise of the book is simple: due to 'an implacable polytheistic bureaucracy', God is unable to intervene in any of the humanitarian crises occurring across the planet. Stricken with guilt, He takes the form of Sora, a Dinka woman in Darfur, and walks the land, asking for forgiveness. A matter of days later Sora is dead, a casualty of the Darfur genocide ... and God dies with her.

What follows are a series more of linked short stories than a novel in the truest sense, as Currie jumps in place and time examining what happens when the world is given implacable proof of not just the existence of God, but of the Death of God. His characters include Colin Powell (who delivers a memorable, if sadly fictional, broadside to President Bush) through a series of essentially normal people reacting in different ways to God's death - with an aside to meet a talking dog, who ate the flesh of the dead Creator, and whose worldview has changed irrevocably as a result. We see an America wracked first by suicides, and then - as the sun continues to rise and the world continue to exist - by a Cult of the Child, as people seek for something to take the place of religion. We see lovers separated by cultural divides, teenagers rebelling against their parents, the sad inevitabilities of life and death, the power of small town rumour and backbiting to divide and destroy. Ultimately we see a world where nation-states have become secondary to their underlying philosophical differences, as the Postmodern Anthropological Marines fight a losing war against the grimly relentless forces of the evolutionary Psychologists, as what's left of America dulls itself into a chemical lobotomy, passively fleeing from the world around.

Currie darts around ideas with style and flair. As befits an excellent short story writer, his characters are deftly and comprehensively drawn. His themes are both dark and weighty, with a sense of profound despair at times that recalls Carver but, again like Carver, they work because they resonate so well with the real world around us.

There is ultimately little to uplift as you read; it's a bleak vision of the future that mirrors the present around us, and it offers little in the way of solution. Its strengths though make this a book well worth reading; its main weakness that it doesn't quite hang together as a novel. ( )
  MikeFarquhar | Sep 2, 2007 |
Currie creates a frightening futuristic view of the world after God, in the form of a young Dinka woman in Darfur, dies. The almost plausible turn of events after God's demise run from suicide pacts to insanity, to telepathic conversations, to war, to child adoration to hopelessness. The related stories create an inventive realm for Currie's humor and detail to shine. Extremely intersting read while also disturbing and laugh-out-loud funny at almost the same time. ( )
  aimless22 | Aug 9, 2007 |
The first story sets the stage. God comes back to Earth in the form of a Dinka woman in war-torn Sudan, and ends up killed in a battle. The stories that follow are in the world that is post-God, and not only is the theme linked, some of the characters reoccur.

This is one of the best new writers I've read in ages. He is simultaneously reverent and irreverent. ( )
  nunatak | Apr 3, 2007 |
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