My Vacation Reading, Part II

My second complete read over vacation was Godless by Pete Hautman. I've also read Hautman's book Sweetblood. My kneejerk response to Hautman's books is that they are about intriguing things, but the writing doesn't have a lot of snap, crackle, and pop like the writing of, say, a Louise Rennison or a M. T. Anderson. Those writers win me over even when I find problems with their plots or voice. Hautman, not so much.

Godless seemed a little predictable to me. I saw the near disasters coming a mile away. Hautman's thoughts about the book, which he posts at his website, seem pretty on the nail to me. The book does seem to be about religious questions. Questions, no answers, no resolutions. Hautman says, "If you strip away the whole religion thing, Godless is about a big fat nerdy kid named Jason Bock who has an excess of smarts and imagination, and his relationship with his even nerdier snail-collecting best friend Shin."

Yeah, that's pretty much it.

And, by the way, what is this thing so many people have with watertowers? I grew up in a rural area with private wells. I just don't get the mystique.