Every Day is an Atheist Holiday!: More Magical Tales from the Author of God, No!
Jillette, the taller and more verbose half of Penn & Teller, follows up 2011’s God No! with this further exploration of his own atheism. He’s dialed back the angry and condescending tone of the earlier book, allowing his intelligence and razor-sharp wit to shine through. He’s still aggressive and sometimes crude (plenty of spicy language here), but this time he doesn’t give us the impression he thinks we’re a bunch of dimwits. The book has some autobiographical elements (Jillette’s appearances on The Celebrity Apprentice, for example), but mostly it’s a look at various holidays and themed days—Christmas, Halloween, graduation day, the Fourth of July, Easter, April Fool’s Day, etc.—from the author’s delightfully personal angle. He notes, for instance, that Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech doesn’t mention religion, or Jesus, or churches, or the word Christian, addressing everyone, not just the devout. This is a much better book than God No! and will surely appeal not only to Penn & Teller fans but also to readers who welcome the opportunity to examine their own deeply held beliefs from a new angle. --David Pitt