I chose to read this book because I needed to read a book that had won a National Book Award for my English class. I would teach this book in a classroom setting, and would recommend other schools do the same. The book has some great messages that teenagers should hear! Such as, it's okay to question a religion and seek out truth for yourself, you don't have to conform to a religion or belief system just because your parents want you to/force you to. To be a successful person who is able to use their own brain and not just follow leadership blindly, you have to question some things in life! The book does a good job at showing that sometimes people can get carried away as well, and that you need to find a good balance in life, and with your friends and family.

Warnings:
- Strong language used including "D", "S", "F", "H" and "A" word
- A kid falls off of the top of a water tower and breaks his leg
- A few kids almost drown inside of a water tank
- Characters discuss beating up each other, and one ends up punching another kid
- Some sexual content is mentioned. A boy watches porn, and he also draws females with extra large breasts that either aren't covered, or are barely covered
- A kid goes to jail and is stuck there for a night

I thought this book was pretty good! It was funny, thought provoking, and did a great job at holding the readers attention throughout the whole book. It felt very relatable, too. Either because I personally related to a specific character and their thoughts and feelings, or because I knew and had friends who were like some of the characters and knew what that entails. While I have a strong belief in my religion, I liked how this book didn't come outright and say "all religion is bad" or "if you're questioning your religion you're wrong" or whatever. The book instead reassured readers that it's okay to question, you should question, and seek out your own answers and truth.

I totally thought this book was going to be about an incredibly intelligent teenage boy who thinks up a ridiculous religion. He would then form reasons why it's inevitable to worship a giant water tower, rally up a bunch of people, con them for their money and then make them all realize (to some extent) that faithfully attending religious meetings and believing in it alone, is not going to get you saved.

I was so excited to read this book but it just turned into an epic fail.
The book is about an ignorant teenage punk who likes drawing naked chicks (no respect for women) and gets a few other stupid teens to make ignorant decisions that only get them in trouble with the authorities. A perfect reason for their parents not to trust them. What's the moral to this book? Lying is the best way to make yourself look like a fool? Great lesson but I already knew that. This was a waste of my time.

I wouldn't recommend this book.
Warning: Probably a waste of your time as well.

Jason is a questioner and dares to question his religion. In doing so, he mocks religion by creating a religion of his own. He has an inner struggle with trying to find himself and learning who he wants to be. Several “join” his religion, but they don’t know anything about it. It’s more of a social thing. It ends up getting them and him in trouble as things get a bit out of control. Jason gets blamed for most of what happens, and he is ok with that.

This book was a bit boring for me, if I am to be honest. I expected to be a lot more challenged in my thinking. Jason is a just a knot headed teen who is trying to figure out where he fits in his world. He doesn’t think through all of the consequence of his actions and the impulsiveness is appropriate but annoying. Even after getting caught he still fails to realize the full implications of his actions. That was hard for me. It was also difficult to read it in the context of a mother with a teen boy. THAT made it a bit too real for me! Kids just do dumb stuff without even thinking.

My original thoughts on this book were very positive. But the more I discussed it with some classmates, the less I began to like it.

This is the first book I’ve read in a long time, and perhaps the first YA title I’ve ever read, that deals with religion in such a forthright, skeptical way. This appealed to me personally, as I’m not a big fan of organized religion; but I believe there’s also a very valuable lesson for young people in this book. I think everyone can only benefit from taking time to really consider the foundation of their beliefs and decide which of those foundational concepts they truly embrace, and which ones are just dogma that they’ve been following because that’s what everyone else around them does. I think the issue of religion in this book is incidental to that idea of questioning and probing what one really believes in.

Ironically, although Jason (the protagonist) seems to start this process of questioning beliefs off with his creation of a satirical/rebellious religion, he seems like the one who gains the least from the events that follow. At the end of the story, he seems to have ended up more or less exactly as he was at the beginning; and it seems to me that he didn’t even see what was going on around him enough to appreciate the experience and learn something about himself, the people around him, or the situation.

Jason's best friend, Shin, goes on the most extreme journey, and seems to end up the worse off from it;  and yet, he has found within himself the ability to truly believe. And he may end up being a stronger person when it’s all said and done, as he seems to be getting psychological help that will hopefully strengthen him as a person.

Town bully and crazy person Henry Stagg comes out of the experience with a broken leg and a new, respectable girlfriend. Magda, the lone female to get any halfway significant lines, gets the chance to see beyond her bubble of small-town life and religion, and ends up with a boy she would probably not have talked to if not for their Chutengonian adventure. Even Dan Grant, the boring cypher, sees that he’s happier with the life he had that was straight-forward and acceptable, and he seems happy to get back to it. Only Jason seems to be right where he was at the beginning - unhappy with his lot in life and his current situation, thinking that most people seem to have it better than him (he spends a large chunk of the last two pages explaining his envy of just about every other character).

Jason has more guts and imagination than a lot of realistic fiction characters - he’s willing to turn his life, and the lives of others, upside-down to try to prove a point - and he takes action when things are not to his liking. But despite his action, he doesn’t seem to move forward. It’s an unusual character arc. I’m curious to see what others take away from this book.

The more I think about the story, the more irate I get with Jason, and with Hautman. I was so focused on the plot, which was interesting enough to keep me engaged, that I kind of missed that the characters are not very well realized, and that Jason is pretty selfish. Though I guess that does help explain why Jason's the only one that doesn't really seem to learn much from the experience - he's so focused on himself that he pretty much misses how this was a transformative experience!

Jason is an unreliable narrator because he's so focused on himself that he is leaving major gaps in the story (mostly in terms of helping the audience understand why the other characters are involved - Jason seems content to just accept that they are joining up) and is not as aware as he should be of the impact of his actions. In that sense, Jason is unreliable at providing a complete view of what is going on. It's almost like we're watching the movie Rashomon, which tells a story by showing the same event from several different characters' perspectives to provide the audience with the full picture - except this version only gives us one perspective, and it's limited by a decent dose of egotism.

Godless by Pete Hautman is a novel about the religious struggles of 15-year-old Jason Bock. Unsure of what he believes in, but against the Catholicism he was raised with, Jason searches for something to believe in. He finds his new god after receiving a punch from his bully, Henry. He lands on the ground with something new to worship. The town’s water tower. Thus the new Chutengodian religion is born. He gets his friends to join his religion, with his best friend Shin becoming the First Keeper of the Secret Text, Dan Grant as the First Acolyte Exaltus, and Magda the High Priestess. Things go awry when Henry becomes High Priest due to him having climbed the water tower. This angers some of the other members as Henry has bullied them. Without Shin, the rest of the clergy decide to climb the water tower and Henry falls, breaking his leg on the pavement. Henry is sent to the hospital and the rest of the crew lands in jail. Jason then realizes that he’s flown too close to the sun in creating his own religion and has to determine the best way to balance his created religion and his friends.

Jason didn’t mean to cause trouble, but when he decides to try creating a new religion, that’s about all he manages to have. Jason wonders why a religion succeeds, and decides to test it with worshipping the Ten-Legged One, or rather, the town’s water tower. He recruits his best
friends to help, and inadvertently recruits a bully and a beautiful girl. This is the start of the trouble, for Henry (the bully) wants all to meet at the top of the tower and swim inside, and it ends with Henry falling off the top to the catwalk below. All is exposed and Jason now must come to grips with the power of suggestion.

This is a good suspense novel, and Hautman has done a good job creating a religion (complete with texts and commandments), causing readers to question things. Some parents may not like the fact this book blatantly dismisses God (Jason’s eyes—not Jason’s parents’ eyes) and encourages free thinking about religion. But Jason is a wonderful character, and I love getting to know him throughout the book. His creativity is especially neat. Overall I would recommend this book for teen areas of the library, and hope it comes out in paperback soon so I can use it
with my teen book club.

This book made me think critically about religion and belief systems when I first read it and still comes to mind every time I discuss religion with someone who thinks differently than I do.

Godless is an extremely enjoyable book and it is not at all what I expected it to be. It follows a teenager named Jason Bock who randomly decides to make-up his own religion and then convinces all of his friends to begin worshipping a water tower. While this new religion of Jason's was initially intended to be nothing but a joke, things quickly take a serious turn, and it all winds up have more lasting consequences than he was expecting. I haven't read a novel this fun in a long time. I mean, the plot is pretty ingenious and its execution isn't bad, either. Plus, the writing is witty and the whole thing is good for a laugh. Godless manages to have a pleasant message, as well, without feeling at all preachy, which is something that I was worried about going into it. My only issue is with the characters. None of them are especially likable, and the dynamics between them are often awkward and unpleasant, being that their friendships are so flimsy and none of them seem to like each other much. Also, the portrayal of Magda Price, the only important female character in the book, is quite frustrating. She is definitely over-sexualized throughout the book and most of the male characters don't treat her very well.

It's easy to create a new religion.

All you need is a god and some disciples.



The hard part is keeping your followers from doing stupid things in the name of religion.

Eh, it's been so long since I've read this, I can only remember that it was short (under 200 pages) and therefore painless. Jason Bock decies to create his own made up religion (centred around a god based upon the town's water tower) and drags a bunch of his classmates into it. Obviously, it goes too far. Cult behaviour, false visions, people getting hurt for the sake of the faith, etc.

I appreciate the premise, but it was just... blah. Yeah, blah. Also, the token girl character, Magda, sucked.

From the Educator's Guide at the back of the book:

n  "Teenager Jason Bock thinks more about a confrontation with volatile Henry Stagg, his friendship with snail and slug-loving oddball Shin, and his uncertain feelings for pretty Magda Price than he does about his faith. Then a simple gag makes faith the centerpiece of his summer: What if the town water tower is God? ... While bringing to the fore penetrating questions about faith, "Godless" is also an insightful, often amusing narrative of what really goes on during a seemingly slow-paced teen summer. The novel neither exalts nor eschews established religion, but instead explores the nature of worship, the act of questioning one's beliefs, and the power of charisma and clever ideas. Jason Bock is a compelling antihero, a leader who never intended to lead, and an ordinary teenager facing the extraordinarily timeless challenge of wondering if there is a place for God in his complex, commodified, and mostly secular life."n

I quite enjoyed Godless. It is well-written, often funny, simple at face value yet laced with complex undertones, and it explores religion, group dynamics and various other topics in ways teenagers can understand, even 16 years later. The two original main characters, Jason and Shin, are imaginative nerds who lose themselves in pop culture revelry and daydream interesting altered realities at random narrative intervals, which is fun to read. Meanwhile, there is rivalry, love interest, mental health concern, and just the right dose of quirky parenting to enjoy. Oddly-enough, some people may be offended by the questioning of Christianity and religion involved in Godless, but those people are probably silly. More likely, these days, people will be offended by the page that uses the word "fag" in a derogatory fashion -- as teenagers were sadly wont to do back then; the fat-shaming that goes on in the book (ditto), though this is brought up as something to be discussed and addressed by readers in the 'Educator' section; and the main character being a 'cisgender' white male, which, while understandably out of fashion, has gone a bit overboard in its general absence of late. There have been almost zero quality books aimed at cisgender male teens, with cisgender white male protagonists, for several years. It is wonderful and amazing and just to see the diverse array of fiction for teens of colour and teens of different genders and/or sexualities, and the millions of fiction books aimed at teen girls of all diverse and wonderful stripes and situations -- and of course a cisgender white male can read and enjoy any of those... but it's also nice for cisgender white male teens to see themselves or people of their relatively-privileged status (that they did not ask for) reflected in fiction from the last 10 years too, and not just Harry Potter, which barely counts (sure there are some, like Steelheart and Red Rising, but not many that I know of, and almost none that don't focus on silly levels of violence or low-quality production. I guess you could argue John Green books, but are they really aimed at teen guys?). Perhaps these characters can even do progressive things, such as question their religion and realize they are flawed and life is complicated -- as Jason does in Godless. / rant

Oh, there isn't really any drug use in the book, zero sex, and not much physical violence either, other than a couple very well-placed punches. One paragraph references a teen (Henry) having been beaten by his father as a child, in passing.

The book is well set up to be taught in schools or used in book clubs, and that is just dandy. It's also a pretty quick read. I read it in an afternoon and I'm not the fastest reader in the world.

n  4.3 Starsn






n  Notes (spoilers)n

- Page 3: "fag" is mentioned many times on this one page, with teens calling each other fag in a derogatory way. This sucks, and is pretty much dead now, which is great, but this is a real thing that really happened back then.

- The rationale for the 'Chutengodian' religion is largely expressed on page 19 and page 90

- The way the religion is presented, with Bible-style water quotes per chapter and the piecemeal composition of Jason matched to the serious and over-detailed obsession of Shin, works pretty well

- Pg 99: Excellent use of snails. Shin raises snails. He is said to be their God. He also acts like a snail, moving in a slow but determined fashion, until something scares him and he hides in his 'shell'. The snails are also highly-reliant on water, which ties in with the 'Chutengodian' Water Tower religion, where water is sacred -- especially to Shin.

- Pg 115: They swim in the Water Tower. Inside the Godhead. It's crazy Henry's idea, and the others follow. It seems ridiculous, but there's a girl involved, and things happen when you hang out in groups, especially as teens or while intoxicated.

- Page 128: Henry was abused by his father. It sucks, he got hit with a belt, it's only mentioned in one paragraph

- Chapter 23: Great confrontation between Jason Brock and his Religious, Lawyer father. Religious debate, questions, theology, existentialism

- There is a LOVE TRIANGLE (without any sex or even depicted kissing) between the Protagonist Jason, his sort of friend/nemesis Henry, and Magda -- the only teen girl character really in the book

- There is a RELIGIOUS SCHISM (Chapter 25) in the Church of the Chutengodians, when Henry breaks off to form his own religious sect. Jason is pretty much left by himself though, now the leader of a religion of one.

- There is some MENTAL HEALTH stuff going on, though it isn't really properly addressed. Shin becomes totally obsessed with whatever he's into, and his obsession with the Water Tower Religion / Chutengodianism leaves him quite unhinged and spending a few days in the Psych Ward

Pretty good, though I'm not sure why this took the National Book Award. Maybe it's because Hautman gives voice to Everyteen's doubts about religion. Jay (protagonist) just decides to create his own, and his god is none other than a water tower. Believe or not, he picks up some acolytes (no fair calling them all wet).

Humorous, light-hearted, and somewhat satirical of religious dogma, GODLESS gives Hautman a chance to score some atheistic hits on Big-G through the voice of Jay and his followers, Henry (little tough guy), Magda (token beautiful girl), Dan (vanilla all around), and Shin (nerd/weirdo).