The World's Smallest Bible

by Dennis Must

The World’s Smallest Bible chronicles the seriocomic boyhood of Ethan and Jeremiah Mueller in mill town Pennsylvania during the height of World War II. As they lose friends and neighbors to the front lines, the boys try to make sense of the mounting darkness with their imaginations—except in their world, no one ever dies. In a private, laconic language, they invent stories that mirror the irrational world around them: a chaplain with bad news becomes the Angel of Death, skeletal Nazis lurk around the corner, and the ghost of a dead playmate taps at their bedroom window in the night. With startling lyricism and narrative grace, Dennis Must has fashioned an indelible vision of the Mueller boys’ blighted youth.

200 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2014

About the author

Dennis Must is the author of four novels: MACLEISH SQ., Red Hen Press, Pasadena, CA (2022), BROTHER CARNIVAL, Red Hen Press (2018), THE WORLD'S SMALLEST BIBLE, Red Hen Press (2014), and HUSH NOW, DON'T EXPLAIN, Coffeetown Press, Seattle, WA (2014), plus three short story collections: GOING DARK, Coffeetown Press (August, 2016), OH, DON'T ASK WHY, Red Hen Press (2007), and BANJO GREASE, Creative Arts Book Company, Berkeley, CA (2000), BANJO GREASE (reissue), Red Hen Press, Pasadena, CA (2019). His plays have been performed Off Off Broadway and his fiction has appeared in numerous anthologies and literary reviews. He resides with his wife in Salem, Massachusetts.

HUSH NOW, DON'T EXPLAIN: 2014 Dactyl Foundation Literary Fiction Award.
2015 International Book Award Finalist in the "Fiction: Literary" Category. It was also shortlisted for the Eric Hoffer Award.

THE WORLD'S SMALLEST BIBLE: USA Best Book Awards Nominee for Literary Fiction 2014.
2015 International Book Award Finalist in the "Fiction: Literary" Category

GOING DARK: International Book Awards Finalist

BANJO GREASE: Nest Generation Indie Book Awards Finalist

MacLeish Sq.: Hawthorne Prize Finalist, 2023; Interantional Book Awards Finalist, 2023; American Writing Awards Finalist, 2023.

Reviews

[Marc]

Never really got in a groove with this book. There were some interesting characters and the writing was solid, but I felt lost through much of it thinking: Uh, so? Yes, it's deep questions like these that keep you reading my reviews, but I can say the summary on the back of the book makes me even more unsure of what I read. I enjoyed the illustrations, although they seemed to interrupt instead of compliment the text, and I was fascinated by the neighbor Stanley who built these wonderful metal contraptions. This might have been 3 stars a month ago, but this is the new, grumpier me doing the ratings.

[LindaJ^]

This is between 2 and 3-star read. I liked parts of the book a lots, such as the part about the illiterate Polish neighbor who was a master at making things out of junk metals. Other parts, such as the younger brother's experience at the carnival and, especially, the Aunt's strip dancing, were repulsive and seemed gratuitous.

This is the story of two brothers, told through the eyes of the older one. They sound sort of lower middle class. The boys see their Dad as a womanizer and their mother as two women in one (a hooker and a prude) with suicidal tendencies. They are very close as youngsters, then drift apart, and later reconnect to a degree. As youngsters, tales of Nazi horrors and lost neighbors are an influence on them both. The older boy, Ethan, becomes fascinated by his Polish, immigrant neighbor. The younger boy, Jeremiah, pulls away from his brother and runs with rougher crowd, until he becomes a Marine reservist. Distressed by the girl who has broken up with him, Jeremiah burns up the family car and does damage to himself. Contrary to what we've been led to believe about the father, his actions in connection to this seem to show that he loves his son deeply.

The last, short, part of the book is called "Coda to the World's Smallest Bible 1977-85." I did not quite understand the point the author was making. I was ready to give the book a 3 star, particularly for creativity, until I read this part and just did not get it. Perhaps when this is discussed as the July pick of the 21st Century Literature Group I will appreciate it better and revise my rating.

[Portia]

Dennis Must describes pre-and post-WWII Pennsylvania with such accuracy that I was certain he had lived there then. His images of high school basketball courts emptied of the boys who once played there because they are fighting and dying far, far away reminded me of late August in my home state. The presentation of cherished items to boys still living by the mothers of boys who would never those items again is heart-wrenching. The evolution of the family that moves in next door is "can't look away" fascinating. Must takes us along with two brothers as they move to maturity, learning, and learning the accept, the truths about people and, finally, of themselves.

[John Hanscom]

Maybe less. There have been a lot of good "coming of age" books. This is not one of them. I gave it a 2 stars as parts are poetic, but, in general, it is unnecessarily obscene, pornographic, obscure, and the author delights in, "mu vocabulary is better than yours.

[Joe]

The premise is promising: two brothers in a small Pennsylvania town dealing with the horrors of WWII through their fertile imaginations. Or rather, that's what the back cover summary makes it out to be and initially it starts off strong.

We meet Ethan and Jeremiah when they're both young, reeling from the death of their playmate (whose ghost they believe haunts them at night), watching as the town's teenaged boys enlist in the war and return home in coffins, and dealing with the strained relationship between their philandering father and personality disordered mother.

It's when the novel shifts tone to now teenaged Ethan and Jeremiah that it loses steam. The entire second act focuses on Ethan's relationship with his alcoholic, potentially mentally ill neighbor and his futile attempt of building a perpetual motion machine. Jeremiah appears very little in this section.

The final act falls flat, dealing with 40-something Ethan and Jeremiah's strained relationship. By this point Must's writing becomes increasingly lyrical and surreal. Had the story focused solely on the first act the lyricism and surrealism could've have been compelling and heartbreaking. Instead, by its conclusion, it seemed overwrought and I just didn't care anymore.

Also, the illustrations are fantastic but seem completely and totally out of place. This might've been better as a graphic novel. Overall, I didn't really care for this book.

[Clemens Schoenebeck]

Don't even start reading TWSB if you are seeking a story neatly wrapped, guiding you to a happy, "feel good" ending. But if you are willing to enter Dennis Must's writing without a preconceived notion of where you expect to go, you will enter the magic of his spare and poetic craft. Whether you are with Ethan and Jeremiah Mueller in their haunted bedroom, or standing with the brothers as they watch their father dress up and pamper himself in preparation for one of his Saturday night escapes, you are right there--in the middle of the scene. And yet the reader feels detachment, space enough from these human characters, as if you are looking through a veil of reality. We see them all: the restless father, suicidal mother, the hopeful and searching brothers, the slowly-going-crazy neighbor obsessively building his perpetual motion machine. Must makes the reader "feel" who these people are. They are searchers. And the redemption and whatever heaven they are searching for may not be available within the severe limits of their life in Hebron. As a reader, I took something away for myself. And that is that searching is indeed part of life. And what we seek may not be within our vision.

[Susan Rodriguez]

This was the first book I won and read from Goodread's and it was interesting but at times had me scratching my head wondering what was real and what the boys were imagining. It was a kind of depressing end as well. I couldn't put it down because I was always wanting to know what was going to happen next though so I would recommend others read it.

[Elizabeth]

Not sure why but I expected this book to be better than what it was. I finished the book in one night, but I must say that its more graphic than I wanted it to be and than what I expected. I love the fact that it has some illustrations, I think it makes it stand out, and they truly are great. If you don't mind having graphic images in your head than this is a great book.

[Alison]

It didn't grab me, so I quit. Maybe another time. I loved the illustrations. I think more books should have illustrations, like the good-old days.

[Dennis Must]

“Award-Winning Finalist in the “Fiction: Literary” category of the 2014 USA Best Book Awards”

[Diane]

Well written, but maybe men could relate more

[Casceil]

DNF. I found the book was making me depressed.