Southernmost

I greatly anticipated reading this book and was underwhelmed after reading it. I found it to be a superficial treatment of an important issue in the life of many Americans. The characters were shallow, the nuances in their personalities were not explored and it took far too long for the protagonist to connect with his brother and precious little effort spent to explore the complex relationship between the two brothers. I expected from this acclaimed author and was disappointed. While it is admittedly difficult to adequately delve into religion and its many nuances, the distinction between "good" and "evil" is much more nuanced than Mr. House would have us believe based upon the descriptions of the attitudes of his characters in this book. All in all, he attempted to tackle some very intriguing topics and, in my opinion missed his opportunity to challenge his readers.

In an editorial in today's Washington Post, E.J. Dionne writes that "[m]any young people [have come] to regard religion as 'judgmental, homophobic, hypocritical and too political.'" Asher Sharp couldn't agree more. He's a Holy Roller pastor who's having a crisis of faith. He's been harboring some long-standing guilt about how he and his mother treated his brother when he came out as gay, and when he's forced to turn away a gay couple seeking shelter in a flood, his crisis comes to a head. In trying to accept the two men into his church, he loses his pulpit, and in trying to bring his more liberal thinking into his own home, he loses his wife and son.

Faced with a protracted custody battle, Asher kidnaps his son, Justin, and spirits him away to Key West to find Asher's long-estranged brother, Luke. What follows is... not much. Justin and Asher find a home at a small resort hotel on the island, and Asher works as a general handyman. But neither of them do much, except think deep thoughts about God, and faith, and the church, and judgment, and holiness. This is a very introspective, slow-moving, but beautifully written book.