Not exactly a book review, but a Bloody Good Read

I've just finished one of the most inventively written, gripping novels I've read in a long time - it's part dark fantasy, part horror, part tender love story, part mystery, 100 per cent blasphemy (from a Christian's point of view - not from mine)... and a compulsive read as far as I'm concerned. A lot of things are topsy-turvy - a good man who turns into the Devil yet is still a good Devil, leaving God to come off very much an unlikable second-best... if indeed God can be said to BE likable at all in the first place. Let me hasten to add that the aforementioned is MY opinion. The novel certainly isn't an in-your-face theological argument pitting Good against Evil or implying that God is Good against the Devil is Evil.

Anyway, I'm not going to bother with a formal review other than saying that I swallowed this book in one unbroken gulp, no pause for breath or loo breaks. If you want reviews, you can always google them... but here's the NYTimes Book Review link anyway. I just wanted to highlight a quote from the book which I love love love! Here goes:

"I do not claim that God is dead. I tell you He is alive and well but in no position to offer salvation, being damned Himself for His criminal indifference. He was lost the moment He demanded fealty and worship before He would offer His protection. The unmistakable bargain of a gangster. Whereas the devil is anything but indifferent. The devil is always there to help those who are ready to sin, which is another word for "live"."

How true is that?

Oh, and one other thing - Joe Hill is Stephen King's son. That I discovered by chance, thanks to Google. All I can say is that good writing MUST be in the genes...