Does anyone know this The Rev? I think he's posted on ChristianDebates@groupsmsn.com before and I had a disagreement with him. I think he and my father would get along. Check out the line I've bolded!!!
Love to get your opinions...Thanks, Donald
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| Reviewed by: The Rev | 27th Sep 2002 |
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Father's TouchDonald D'Haene | Purchase this book at B&N |
The list of positive reviews, blurbs, etc. for this book is far-reaching and astounding. And if these people are to be trusted, then it makes me wonder whether a single one of them has ever read a book before. Before getting to the many stylistic problems with it, there are two major issues of subject matter that need to be mentioned. First and foremost, by the end of Chapter 2, D'Haene has already cut himself off at the knee. Starting there, and throughout the book, he makes reference to his being sexually abused by his father and says, many times, that he enjoyed what was happening. He then turns around, sometimes in the same sentence, and goes on the attack. There is no middle ground, no area where we understand the link between point A and point B; either the author himself is too confused to draw the map for us, or he thinks we'll understand how to get there without one. In either case, that one problem with the book is already enough that any major publisher would have sent it back requesting extensive revision. Secondly, D'Haene falls into the politically correct trap of equating sexual abuse and rape, two entirely different things. This is a dangerous grey area both legally and politically in today's climate, and it is, to say the least, a sign of extreme irresponsibility on the parts of both author and publisher that D'Haene refers to acts of sexual assault as rapes. Someone should have caught it and sent it back requesting revisions. Again. Those aside, if the book had been well-written otherwise, it might perhaps have had the skeleton of something worth saving in a second edition. This is not the case. D'Haene's testimony (for calling it a book is something of a stretch, save that it is bound and sold) is written like a children's book in that the chapters vary widely in length, but not for emphatic purposes as much as simply running out of steam in certain narrative flows. Also, tenses shift without warning, leading the reader to confusion at times. Plot points of interest, including a major one early on in the book, are picked up and then left to die. The style of the book is less that of autobiography than it is unedited journal; at times, D'Haene will rattle off half a dozen questions at himself without ever answering them, or let a flood of emotions pour out, exclamation points included, without going back and revising into some readable state later. Perhaps in other hands, this could have become a compelling memoir; as it stands now, it's pretty much unreadable. | |