Call number
Series
Collection
Publication
Orlando: Harcourt Brace, 1996
Pages
404
Description
God's just been a deep-freeze coma in the Arctic. Strapped for cash, the Vatican has sold the body (a bargain at $1.3 billion!) to Baptists in Florida. Enterprising souls that they are, they've turned the Corpus Dei into a popular two-mile-long theme-park attraction at Orlando's Celestial City USA-hooked up to the largest life-support system on earth. Then things get weird. Martin Candle, a justice of the peace who's suffered a series of devastating setbacks, decides to put Him on trial in The Hague for crimes against humanity. Now, to accumulate evidence for the prosecution, Candle enters God's brain on a steamer to find out what in the world the Almighty could possibly have been thinking all these years.
Language
Original language
English
Original publication date
1996
Physical description
404 p.; 9.5 inches
ISBN
0151886563 / 9780151886562
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User reviews
LibraryThing member paradoxosalpha
It has been almost a decade since I read and enjoyed James Morrow's Towing Jehovah, the novel to which Blameless in Abaddon is a sequel. So it's hard for me to know whether to attribute perceived differences in quality to changes in the writing or changes in myself as a reader. Be that as it may, I
While the first volume accounted for the recovery of the gigantic corporeal form of the Biblical God from the ocean, this one is concerned with an effort to put that body on trial for the world's evils. Accordingly, its literary grounding explicitly combines Moby Dick and Job, while its theological speculation is intensely focused on the matter of theodicy. Consistent with the framing of the story in Job, Morrow has Satan himself (an Idea in the mind of God) serve as the book's narrator, although this conceit slips a little when the protagonist Martin Candle actually encounters Satan.
There is a parallel in the narrative development here with the later Well-Built City Trilogy of Jeffrey Ford, to the point where I wonder if they share some prior literary paradigm which is eluding my attention. In both series, the second book concerns itself crucially with an entry into and objective experience of the mind of the first book's great bugbear (Jehovah for Morrow, Drachton Below for Ford), who is now in an incapacitated state of decline.
I aim not to let another decade intervene before I read Morrow's third volume The Eternal Footman.
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liked this second book a good deal better. While the first volume accounted for the recovery of the gigantic corporeal form of the Biblical God from the ocean, this one is concerned with an effort to put that body on trial for the world's evils. Accordingly, its literary grounding explicitly combines Moby Dick and Job, while its theological speculation is intensely focused on the matter of theodicy. Consistent with the framing of the story in Job, Morrow has Satan himself (an Idea in the mind of God) serve as the book's narrator, although this conceit slips a little when the protagonist Martin Candle actually encounters Satan.
There is a parallel in the narrative development here with the later Well-Built City Trilogy of Jeffrey Ford, to the point where I wonder if they share some prior literary paradigm which is eluding my attention. In both series, the second book concerns itself crucially with an entry into and objective experience of the mind of the first book's great bugbear (Jehovah for Morrow, Drachton Below for Ford), who is now in an incapacitated state of decline.
I aim not to let another decade intervene before I read Morrow's third volume The Eternal Footman.
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LibraryThing member TheAmpersand
"Blameless in Abaddon" is a good and useful book in a lot of ways, but I don't think it works as well as some of the other James Morrow I've read. It focuses on Martin Candle, a justice of the peace and small claims court judge in rural Pennsylvania who also serves as a modern stand-in for Job.
Unfortunately, the book drags elsewhere. Martin's courtroom strategy involves putting all of God's misdeeds and omissions before the court, and, as you'd expect, it's a pretty long list. Both Morrow and Martin would have done best to keep short but representative: Martin's catalog of horrors can be downright depressing. I also get the feeling that "Blameless in Abbadon" didn't have to be as long as it is: while it's characters are well formed and the book is well written it takes a long time to get where it's going and stays there a long time. And while this may just be a lead-in to the book's final chapter, the end is something of a deus ex machina that seems to throw a lot of the argument that preceded it right out the window. Even so, Morrow frames his characters' arguments both skillfully and humorously, there are parts of the book, especially Martin's encounters with the deceased, that are genuinely affecting. But this certainly isn't where I'd start with Morrow. And that's my review. "The Eternal Footman" awaits.
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Once he loses everything he has, he decides to bring a suit against God himself in the International Court of Justice in the Hague (I suppose this novel takes place in some far-out world in which the United States has actually recognized the court's authority). Having previously visited God in his Florida theme park home, the Almighty is shipped to Holland and put on the dock. Theme parks in general and religiously oriented theme parks in particular are pretty soft satirical, but Morrow's take on them is amusing enough. More successful is his description to Martin Canlde's expedition to Jehovah's brain, a sort of theme-park conglomeration of Platonic ideals and Biblical characters. It's in this stimulatingly strange Pee-Wee's Playhouse of the mind that the book's best scenes are set: Martin and his fellow travelers, including a demon and St. Augustine, discuss the ins and outs of theodicy with an assortment of Biblical notables and other residents of God's own thinkin' meats. Morrow's got a wonderful gift for satire, and both enlightening amusing to hear theology discussed by comically deadpan Holy Land notables. "Blameless in Abbadon" is a good book for people who are interested in philosophical ideas but have trouble with philosophical language: the sort -- and I'll include myself -- who understand an argument better if it's portrayed in a fictional frame.Unfortunately, the book drags elsewhere. Martin's courtroom strategy involves putting all of God's misdeeds and omissions before the court, and, as you'd expect, it's a pretty long list. Both Morrow and Martin would have done best to keep short but representative: Martin's catalog of horrors can be downright depressing. I also get the feeling that "Blameless in Abbadon" didn't have to be as long as it is: while it's characters are well formed and the book is well written it takes a long time to get where it's going and stays there a long time. And while this may just be a lead-in to the book's final chapter, the end is something of a deus ex machina that seems to throw a lot of the argument that preceded it right out the window. Even so, Morrow frames his characters' arguments both skillfully and humorously, there are parts of the book, especially Martin's encounters with the deceased, that are genuinely affecting. But this certainly isn't where I'd start with Morrow. And that's my review. "The Eternal Footman" awaits.
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LibraryThing member libraryofus
(Amy) Not content to leave God's corpse at the North Pole, humanity has dragged it out to Orlando, FL to serve as a tourist attraction. Unfortunately for humanity, God may not be quite as dead as they think.
LibraryThing member the_awesome_opossum
Blameless in Abaddon is technically the sequel to Morrow's Towing Jehovah, but it works perfectly fine on its own. Following a series of tragedies in his life, a small town magistrate named Martin Candle seeks to put God on trial for the suffering He has allowed in his world. God's comatose form
The premise certainly could have been led to absurdity, but Blameless in Abaddon never feels that way. The book takes the issue of theodicy seriously and comprehensively, explaining and breaking down the best defenses. It's a thought-provoking book, which offers no easy answers but forces readers into their own examination of evil in the world.
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(previously the attraction of a Florida theme park) is transported to the Hague and Martin and his opponent Lovett hold a trial before the UN. The stakes: if Martin wins his case, he would disconnect God's life support as revenge for His crimes.The premise certainly could have been led to absurdity, but Blameless in Abaddon never feels that way. The book takes the issue of theodicy seriously and comprehensively, explaining and breaking down the best defenses. It's a thought-provoking book, which offers no easy answers but forces readers into their own examination of evil in the world.
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