Spies, Souls and Superpowers

Here's my first post-Christmas recommendation in the novel department: Bob Shacochis' "The Woman Who Lost Her Soul."  It's violent and heartbreaking, to be sure, a meditation on the wounds that drive men and women to inflict other wounds.  But Shacochis tells a story about us--about the last 30 years--that feels true and authentic.

In a book this long (700+ pages), there are dozens and dozens of characters.  But a favorite of mine is Paige Burnette, the mother of a Shacochis protagonist.  "All my life," she says to her Delta Force son, prepping for another harrowing mission, "I've lived with men who thought too much about something that does not matter to me, Eville.  Glory.  I think it was an instinct in them.  They were always humble men, and you're just like them.  They found glory I guess, and maybe you will too, but I never knew them to find a use for it."

Among other things, Shacochis asks some troubling and worthwhile questions about the role of religion in marking our wounds and sanctifying our anger.  A good read.