Campbell Andrews > Recent Status Updates

sheesh, talk about burying the lede

Catholics seem weird on sex, but only compared to what we're used to. Might as well be acquainted with the frailty of the body and the corporeal realities of blood, sweat, and spit.

Catholics seem weird on sex, but only compared to what we're used to. Might as well be acquainted with the frailty of the body and the corporeal realities of blood, sweat, and spit.

"It was possible to buy a pro-life pizza, despite the fact that a pizza is by its very definition made out of choices."

Yes, picking your toppings is like choosing to terminate a pregnancy.

Ms. Lockwood is occasionally so unexamined that it's shocking- especially from someone who's so sharp otherwise.

I'm always struck in spiritual autobiography, as (rightfully) bubbles to the surface in this memoir, how the writer inevitably contorts her own reasoning into righteousness. We all do it.

I respect the credence she gives to doubt, but no: I do not understand how Ms. Lockwood "had to leave right-thinkingness behind."

sorry, I don't believe a 3-year-old has this kind of recall.

"It looked like the place where Smokey the Bear went to cheat on his wife."

The Beach waterpark she's referring to isn't in St. Louis, it's in Ohio- a half-hour's drive from where she grew up in Cincinnati. (I've been there, and you can view the commercial she describes on youtube.)

Facts & continuity are not her strong suit. "Memoir" has lots of meanings, I guess.

Finally in the 6th chapter (its best yet) she distills things to the heart of the matter:

"what is the us, and what is the them, and how do you ever move from one to the other?"

and

"I'm beginning to think... the position is more powerful than the man."

"A we is so powerful. It is the most corrupt and formidable institution on earth. Its hand are full of the crispest and most persuasive currency. Its mouth is full of received, repeating language. The we closes its ranks to protect the space inside it, where the air is different. It does not protect people. It protects its own shape."

quite good on the abuse scandal. it's well-worn territory but her perspective is unique and she is able to retain the shock and disappointment that it deserves.

the milf lies are VERY funny

"C.S. Lewis defines music as 'a meaningless acceleration in the rhythm of celestial experience,' but music can also be..."

except that in Screwtape Letters, Lewis' narrator is basically Old Scratch, the devil himself. so we are meant to take this definition as *negative*- no "but" needed. Has Ms. Lockwood read the book or even familiarized herself with it??

"I grew up to have sex with human beings"

said the married woman... multiple? foreshadowing?

"I had never been much interested in story"

you don't say! now, turns of phrase...

terrific when specific: "If Jesus himself appeared in their midst and said 'Eat my body,' they would first slather mayonnaise all over him."

but not so much in its generalizations: "All fathers believe they are God, and I took it for granted that my father especially believed it."

also I doubt Lutherans would gasp at a nursing child's faux pas. more like laugh.

reeeallly interested in this one.

not Catholic, but am a Christian & how this is blurbed/sold fascinates me. but alarm bells are already going off:

- Oh, those weird Catholics!

- endorsements from Joss Whedon & Andy Richter, whose work I've loved but whose public utterances have shown them to be, shall we say, other than nonpartisan

so we shall see. may have lots to say (see review of In The Land of Believers)

Sweet Lord I don't think I can do it. Gaffes abound but most of all it's such a BORING book, like watching TV when you know it's about to break for commercial

"Like a thousand-legged centipede"

aka a milipede

Attack of the Living Dead- these aren't refugees, they're zombies

"You'd be surprised at the things I know, Gaetan. There is more than one kind of prison."

There are eye-rollers on every. single. page. At this rate I will never finish, so I will try and limit my comments to things that make me laugh out loud and/or shake with anger.

I may not finish it anyway.

"wiry as an apostrophe mark"

Here we go again. "an apostrophe *mark*"? Why not just "an apostrophe?"

how "wiry" is an apostrophe, anyway? Last I checked it was a single stroke.

Or did she mean wiry as a _question_ mark?? "question" must more certainly be accompanied by "mark", and that bit of punctuation, with its curve, is much more "wiry" than an apostrophe.

This book was hardly edited, if at all.

"The automobile made its slow, agonizing way..." and then 2 paragraphs later: "The car lurched forward and stopped hard. Isabelle hit the seat in front of her."

Physics, anyone?

"Beside them, a horn aah-ooh-gahed."

Oh my word, it's an actual cartoon

Are there French novels about prewar U.S. that traffic in as much cliche and fetishism?

Yep. I just finished a novel in which the characters were not native French speakers, and "Mon Dieu" was an occasional exclamation that served to emphasize their amazement *and* cosmopolitan bonafides.

But in this one? The characters _are_ French, so English punctuated by "Mon Dieu" (3 times by 2 characters in this chapter alone) can only be to lend authenticity to their portrayal. Lazy.

"A girl. A hero? Absurd."

I fear this is a Hallmark novel, historical fiction for people who imagine if they lived then they would do the right thing.

2nd chapter and we've already moved from 1st to 3rd person: danger!

"sanding a chair that was already soft as satin"

is he sanding the cushion? is it a bean bag chair??