Rating: 
Summary: Very well done - and I NEVER read Science Fiction
Review: Wow - what a concept. G-d has died and fallen into the sea. Now the angels have approached the Vatican, as well as a sea captain with a tainted history, to tow him to a glacial crypt so he won't decompose. Although I never read sci-fi, I had to pick this one up. Contrary to some other reviews, I did laugh out loud -- several times! Just picture a nun and a high priest tooling around G-d's belly button in a 4 wheel drive. Of course they are searching against all hope for proof that the Creator has a Creator above him. The alternative is that there is no G-d; no one watches over mankind anymore and there will be no rewards or punishments in the great beyond...imagine the potential for world chaos. I can see this as an epic movie -- there are certainly enough twists and turns to keep a reader interested. Everyone I have recommended it to can't wait to read it. Try it..
Rating:
Summary: Top-Notch, Unique Fantasy!
Review: Sea captain Anthony Van Horne, who blames himself for an ExxonValdez-style oil spill years ago, is suddenly visited by an angel whobears the most profound - and disturbing - tidings of all time. GodHimself is dead, and His two-mile-long corpse has fallen into theAtlantic Ocean! The Host of Heaven are dying of grief, the angelexplains, and as their last act of worship they've prepared a tomb forJehovah in a huge iceberg in the Arctic. Van Horne can achieve somevindication by towing the late Creator's body to His frozencrypt. At the helm of the supertanker Carpco Valparaiso (the shipinvolved in the earlier maritime disaster), and flying the flag of theVatican, Van Horne leads a ragtag crew on a secret mission to find Hiscorpse and steer Him to His final resting place. Along the way, theyrescue a militant feminist-atheist who, when she discovers the natureof their mission, secretly decides that she must find a way to preventthis "proof" from becoming known to the world atlarge. Morrow's Towing Jehovah is an absolutely brilliant and oftenqueasily unsettling satire that explores many of the great issues ofreligion, faith, and skepticism. Using the tanker's crew as amicrocosm of society, Morrow takes jabs at Catholics, Jews, skeptics,feminists - just about everybody. How would the Catholic Church reactto the news that God really is dead? What would atheists do if theydiscovered they'd been wrong all along? Would there be any reason toadhere to morality, knowing that God is no longer watching? And thegreatest mystery of all - why did He die? I can't recommend thisbook highly enough for fantasy lovers who are tired of the eternalTolkien rehashes. If you're looking for a book that will make youthink about your life, laugh out loud, and groan with embarrassment -sometimes all at once - this is the book for you. Both Believer andSkeptic will enjoy the ideas mulled over in Towing Jehovah - but thethin-skinned should be warned to proceed at their own risk. JohnC. Snider...
Rating: 
Summary: Irreverant and entertaining.
Review: James Morrow's story is startingly original. God is dead, and his lifeless and massive body has fallen into the Atlantic Ocean. Anthony Van Horne, a disgraced oil tanker captain, is recruited by the angel Raphael to tow His body to a final resting place in the Arctic. The ensuing Odyssean voyage challenges the crew's perceptions about God and morality. The result is a divine exploration of the theory that religion is the opiate of the masses. As original as the story is, it never quite rises to the grandeur of its themes, which isn't necessarily a criticism. This is a pleasant and entertaining reading experience, not a dour theocratic and philosophical analysis. Morrow seems to have sacrificed a degree of depth in exchange for loads of irony and dark comedy - not a bad trade.
Rating:
Summary: Hey, God's dead!
Review: The premise alone made me buy this book, which probably qualifies as one of the wackier non-drug induced situations for a book to be based on. In case you haven't gotten the full scoop, here's the deal: an angel comes to Anthony Van Horne and tells him that God has died and his several miles long corpse is floating in the sea. Van Horne's job is to pilot an oil tanker, grab the corpse and tow it to a tomb that the angels have set up in the Arctic. Along the way he has to contend with a feminist who wants to blow the corpse up for the sake of womankind, a Vactian who thinks that God can be revived and the overriding question of what the heck is God doing dead? There really isn't anything sacriligous about this book so if you're looking for something to protest, don't bother looking here, most of the this stuff is treated fairly respectfully, albeit as soon through a somewhat bizarre lens. Most people who have written reviews note that the book really isn't that funny and to that I can only say that Morrow is often compared to Kurt Vonnegut and frankly, Vonnegut isn't a laugh out loud type of writer either, his humor is generally dark, I mean Slaughterhouse-Five was funny but in a more of an ironic sort of way, not because people were slipping on banana peels and stuff. It's the same here, some of the situations are so absurd that you can't help but laugh but this isn't a happy cheery book either. Morrow somehow manages to pull all of this off, and performs the even greater feat of turning characters that should have been cardboard cutouts into real people. Van Horne is by turns stubborn and endearing, pathetic and inspiring. The same with the feminist Cassie Fowler, at first she strikes you as someone who is a one note character but in time reveals greater depths. The plot is a bit of a ramshackle affair, especially toward the end and not everything makes total sense but if you just let yourself go along for the ride, Morrow gives you plenty to think about and there wasn't a moment in the book that I didn't find engrossing. Don't let the title make you think that this is some tract bashing religion, in the end, it's an uplifting book that points one direction humanity might head toward in the future. Recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting but could have been more
Review: I found this book to be, although engrossing at times, a complete let down of what it promises from the back cover. I am disturbed that one can say it contains humour and satire when it is at most times, dark and shocking (now you all want to read it hey?). The storyline is interesting, however some of the characters really got on my nerves. Especially the main woman ( I don't recall her name) who Anthony Van Horne is besotted with. She is a one dimensional character who I think Mr Morrow gave very little thought into. There is very little about her, it seems that her role is to be just the sexy feminist bent on ridding the body of Jehovah ( and even that dead body is more intriguing. I found that I had to wade through about half the book to be fully engrossed in it, the book starts off slow,and continues to be slow.
Rating:
Summary: Quite enjoyable
Review: I found this to be a very well-written, enjoyable book. nlike some, I didn't find the characters to be particularly one dimensional--especially considering the fact that this is a book about ideas, not about people. The tone was similar to Joseph Heller's "Catch-22." I'm not sure that Morrow has explored anything that hasn't been gone over better elsewhere, bt he's certainly managed to turn out a clever and entertaining novel.
Rating:
Summary: Worth the reading
Review: I must admit to having been troubled at times during the reading of this book. It is incredibly thought-provoking with enough humor to keep it from becoming bitter in its satiric tone. My Catholic upbringing bristled at times, but, if read with an open mind and refusal to be "insulted" by another person's ideas, this is a clever and worthwhile novel.
Rating:
Summary: Courageously Sacrilegious
Review: A very powerful, insightful, and to some, sacreligious novel. If one has a strong personal faith, this book will hardly shake it. But for those who search, struggle, and doubt, Morrow is a reflective voice of signicance.
Rating:
Summary: Who you gonna believe?
Review: It's very odd. No, not this book, I'm speaking of the reviews I'm reading about it here. I must say that I find very little humor in Towing Jehovah--or at least not the guffaw kind of humor. Read Stephen Fry for that. No, James Morrow has woven a thoughtful and provocative tale around a most improbable premise (the physical demise of God Almighty). And yet I also find little sacrilege in this, unless perhaps you are endeared with the notion that the Catholic Church is not very much like any other human institution, seeking to perpetuate its own dogma and ideology. Also, I must confess to finding little real satire here, too. Yes, there are the inevitable, and quite brilliantly done, jabs at the foibles of modern man and the society we have built--and especially at the diet we choose to eat--but these jabs are not delivered so as to ridicule or demean. There is no sense that Morrow wants us to join him in holding ourselves aloof from the rest of humanity in snobbish repose and declare solemnly "We are so much better than all that." Read Douglas Adams for that. What I did find was an intellectual, though never daunting work that displays a profound understanding of--and sympathy for--Man at the turn of this century. We may smirk at the idea that the best chef in the Merchant Marines is classified as such not because he prepares gourmet meals, but because he is capable of producing exact replicas of the world's leading fast food (no matter what the meat source). But doesn't that say an awful lot about us and our society? In Morrow's gifted hands it does. Morrow's intent seems less to ridicule Man and his institutions than it does to express faith in our inherent moral fiber. It's less a blaspheme against God of the Old Testament than it is a praise of Emmanuel Kant. In killing off God, and in writing the Jesuit physicist's final deduction of why God has died, Morrow is suggesting a humanist future for Mankind, a future in which we have passed by the need for a governing deity, grown to maturity and cast away the bonds that tie us to our Heavenly Father. Or rather, God has cast aside the bonds for us. If you love someone, let them go. This is not sacrilege, but a kind of theocratic Darwinism. Oh, there now, I went and said that awful name didn't I. Okay, maybe it IS sacrilege. Towing Jehovah: an intelligent and well written tale that DOES make sense no matter what else you read here about it. P.S. Contrary to at least one opinion, I found most of the characters very 3 dimensional. Any author who can take a character like Anthony Van Horne (gruff old sea dog with a penchant for wearing mirrored sunglasses, a down parka and John Deere hat, and who keeps his ships log in a Popeye the Sailor notebook) and make them not only interesting, but believable and compelling deserves respect and admiration. Morrow did, and does.
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful allegory.
Review: It is clear that those other reviewers who didn't enjoy this book didn't understand it. Morrow's subtlety in this work is incredible. He makes an incredible yet subtle allegory between the main character, Anthony Van Horne and his father vs. God and humanity. The Van Horne character is an epic and heroic character on a grand scale. Morrow's stories are not simply clever stories. They are metaphorical and allegorical. The entanglement of these elements reminds me of Herbert's Dune. This book is not to be missed. However, I do not recommend it for people who are used to easy, one-dimensional stories such as some of the previous reviewers.
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