This was a really good book, despite the author. If it weren't for the author, I'd have given in 5 stars, because both Freud and Lewis are such interesting people, or at least wrote interesting things. But my god, this writer was so... argh!!!!

First: There should not be debates between atheists and Christians. Christianity is too specific. There should only be arguments between atheists and theists. The details of theist should be left for later.

Second: CS Lewis is of course well known for being a Christian polemical writer, but why Freud to represent atheism? He was an atheist, that's true, but, you know, Stephen King is an American, and writes a lot about America, but why would we choose him specifically to represent America in a debate about which country is right, America or Country X? One could go so far as to say Freud's atheism was a defining characteristic, but so is Stephen King's being American. It's just not the main things the two are known for.

Third: If Nicholi were trying to rally give an open, even, fair presentation of both men's points of views, he failed hysterically. REALLY!!!!! He is so in favor of Lewis it's astonishing that he'd even write the book and present it the way he did. He's constantly pointing out where Freud was "wrong" (mainly because Freud wasn't happy) and where Lewis was "right" (because Lewis was happy). Dude, that's like saying Justin Bieber's life philosophy is better than, I don't know, Sartre's, because he's a happier person. Dumb.

CS Lewis was not an atheist, ever, I don't believe it. His "atheism" is too romantic, too Byronic, too "if there WAS a god, then why do bad things happen, huh?" It's always fun for Christians to refer back to when they were atheists, because it makes atheism look like some youthful folly, and that people are atheists just won't "grow up." It's so condescending. The funniest part is when Lewis says something like Freud was a great thinking when it came to psychology, but when it came to religion, something Lewis knows a lot about, he was foolish. What's so funny about this is that fact that Lewis himself is one of the clumsiest logicians that publishers bother putting in print. His stepping from point A to B to C is so ridiculous and full of holes, I've thought this about him since I was a teenager and haven't changed my mind. It's like, "When I was an atheist I felt like there should be a better world, but how could I desire a better world if a better world didn't exist? Therefore, there is a better world after this one." I mean, seriously?

On the other hand, Lewis is a fantastic writer, and his power over metaphors and similes is practically unmatched anywhere else in English, or at least that I know of. But this only makes him extremely interesting and a pleasure to read, not correct in his half-assed metaphysics.

Freud, I don't know what to say about him. I liked him a lot more after reading this book that I did before, he's way more, I don't know, "human" than I'd thought he was. At the same time, however, he's kind of like Lewis in that he's an insanely gifted stylist but a lousy logician. The difference between the two, though, in that latter aspect, is that Freud didn't make his life's work center around the question of God, he stuck primarily to what he was good at, that is, psychology; Lewis, on the other hand, made the question of God almost the whole of his entire life, yet seemed to lack the most fundamental skills for arguing his points. He should have written more Narnia books.