Sometimes a single moment in our lives– a loss of control, a blinding passion, a second when that part of ourselves we hadn’t known existed erupts in violence–changes not only the course of our lives but our whole perception of ourselves and the world. Paul Phillips has such a moment one day in the woods, when he attacks a man who is beating a dog; now his life will never be the same.
Paul is a good and decent man. He lives with Kate Ellis and her daughter Ruby. Kate is a recovering alcoholic who has used her experiences in overcoming her addiction to write a book, “Praying Well With Others”, which has become a blockbuster inspirational title; meanwhile, daughter Ruby is increasingly showing signs of mental disorder. The murder of the man in the woods casts an ominous shadow on the lives of this loving family as they wait, not knowing whether Paul will be discovered–and Paul wondering if he should turn himself in.
Author Scott Spencer is a wonderful writer, with multi-faceted characters whose sincerity and introspection are refreshing. Questions of guilt and punishment, good and evil, faith and religion abound; Spencer’s characters ask the questions but leave it to the reader to find the answers– if there are answers.
In this, her religious forties, she has sometimes agonized over why people of advanced intelligence often do not believe there is a supreme being, why it is they, and not the high-school dropouts, who are the ones to insist that logic and all the available proof show that religion is a compendium of rumors and fables and outright bullshit strung together by committees of ancient sun-baked men deprived of all scientific knowledge. Kate has sometimes despaired that the average intelligence in the nation of nonbelievers is drastically higher than the intelligence in the devout community; surely a convention of atheists would be able to run intellectual circles around the membership of most churches. Yet if Christ and his message are real, then the dumbbells win and the chrome domes lose.
Man in the Woods is a downloadable ebook on our North Texas Libraries on the Go site, and can be read on your computer, mobile device, or e-reader, including the Nook and Kindle.
–cary
