Review: The Case for Easter: A Journalist Investigates the Evidence for the Resurrection

The Case for Easter: A Journalist Investigates the Evidence for the Resurrection by Lee Strobel
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I read this over the Easter weekend. It is billed as a hard-hitting journalist's investigation into the resurrection. Unfortunately, it doesn't live up to the hype.

I found the style somewhat annoying. It is structured around a series of interviews with experts but the questions he pitches are hardly Paxman-like in tone. Too often the conversation between author and expert reads something like this:

But what about this difficult thing?

Ah, that is difficult but actually there is this which makes it all better.

Hmm! So, that means bananas aren't really yellow?

Exactly.

If this is an accurate description of how Strobel came to faith, I can't help but feel he was too easily convinced. To be fair though, I believe it is extracted from a longer version of his conversion experience. It is possible it has been over-simplified to make it an easier read.

I think I would have been happier if it had been described as a tract that concisely rehearses the main arguments for the resurrection rather than an investigation by a sceptical journalist. I don't mean this as faint praise; I think the book does a good job of sketching out the main arguments, for example by defending the gospels as historical accounts rather Christian myth.

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Review: Captain Britain: A Crooked World

Captain Britain: A Crooked World by Alan Moore
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Very much a nostalgia-fest for me as I read and loved these stories when they were originally published by Marvel UK. It has been many years since I last read this story and it was even better than I remembered it. It is just bursting with ideas. For example, way before the Civil War storyline was a twinkle in US Marvel's eye, Moore was writing about a government clamping down on superheroes and mutants (by concentration camps and killer bio-machines rather than a wimpy registration act). And talking of killer bio-machines, I could be wrong but I think The Fury pre-dates Cameron's The Terminator. How much I enjoyed this collection can be judged from my only criticism: the lettering on the early episodes looks a bit scrappy!

I grew up reading UK comics and was used to relatively short, weekly episodes but, on this re-reading, I am astonished at how much Moore packs into so few pages per issue. There's tragedy and comedy; magic and science; high concept and high camp. To add to the fun, Marvelman makes a brief cameo. The villains range from the morally questionable to the out and out mental. What makes it even more interesting is the line between good and bad is not always clear and we see Captain Britain wrestling with that very issue. Also, unlike most comic books, there is a genuine sense of peril; I wasn't convinced that my favourite characters would come out of the story alive.

I usually get annoyed by the padding at the end of these collections (early sketches, alternative covers etc.) but here the extras (including an article about Alan Moore) were generally interesting.

Brilliant. Just brilliant.

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Review: The Affair

The Affair by Lee Child
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hmm! I've only read a few of the Jack Reacher books but have generally enjoyed them. This one though, less so. I still basically liked it for it was: good escapist nonsense. But...

My main problem with it was the bits that felt different from others in the series that I've already read. First, the sex scenes were, well, too sexy. (I realise this seems a weird thing to complain about but I don't remember the other books going into so much detail.) Second, one of the conclusions in the book (and I was surprised that it wasn't the conclusion) stretched my credibility way beyond my ability to suspend disbelief. To make matters worse, I could see no reason why the person who helped him out didn't just step in earlier and stop things from escalating in the first place. Lastly, in this book, Jack was a bit too much Judge Judy and executioner for my liking.

There were a couple of other things that niggled me but I already feel churlish for making the above complaints. It was, despite my reservations, a fun read and I will read more in the series as I come across them.

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