In the spirit of the holiday season, I think it is time we all looked into The Atheist’s Guide to Christmas, a series of essays compiled and edited by Robin Harvie and Stephanie Meyers.
The Guide contains 42 short pieces, both fiction and nonfiction, by a number of well known, and some that should be better known, atheist authors. Some of the heavy hitters include Richard Dawkins, Phil Plait, Simon Singh and A.C. Grayling, all names that should be on your radar if you keep track of popular atheist and skeptic literature. The authors skew towards British, but this actually lends the book some Dickensian chops that wouldn’t be there otherwise.
The highlight of the Guide is the variety and quality of some of the writing. You can really tell that some of these people can put pen to paper. My favorite entries were by Adam Rutherford, Brian Cox, Jennifer McCreight and Jamie Kilstein, who all found ways to mix in humor.
The Guide is broken up into six sections: stories, science, how to, philosophy, arts and events. This gives the book some cohesion, and makes for some interesting juxtapositions. For example, Sian Berry’s insipid piece “I’m Dreaming of a Green Christmas,” with suggestions on how to make your holiday more environmentally friendly, is followed by the much more enjoyable “How to Stop Worrying and Enjoy Christmas” by Mitch Benn. I have to think that the editors intended that to be the commentary I read into it.
As with any series of essays and short stories on a narrow topic, the pieces are hit and miss. Some of them feel like they wouldn’t have made the cut if it wasn’t for the name of the person writing. Richard Dawkins and Phil Plait’s entries both come to mind. Dawkins’ piece is particularly bad, with a fictional narrative that turns into counter-apologetics that are intended to be funny, but just seem heavy-handed. On the contrary, the fictional narrative, “A Day in the Life of a Godless Magazine” by relative unknowns Caspar Melville and Paul Sims was one of the funniest things I’ve read in quite a while.
You can also tell that this book is a couple of years old, which is good if you want to get it cheap, but can lead to some entries being a little dated. In particular, Sid Rodrigues’ entry detailing how he came to be married to his beloved Rebecca Watson is awkward in light of their divorce soon after publication.
This book was a good idea, and all of the money made from it went to charity. Like many essay compilations, there isn’t a huge demand for it, so it can be picked up on the cheap. The Kindle edition is only $2.99, and used copies can be picked up for the price of postage.
