You Say Tomato:
the transatlantic correspondence of George and Brad
By Adrian Plass and Paul McClusker. Marshall Pickering. 142 pages. £6.99
ISBN 0 551 02983 8
This is a collection of fictional letters. One writer (Brad) is American. The other (George) is English. The letters try to present problems of communication, the difference of culture (including church culture) and observations on the Christian life. Footnotes give explanations for readers on each side of the Atlantic - for example 'Ribena' is defined on p. 137.
George has lost his wife and is left with a young daughter; Brad's mother is terminally ill; both men are involved in publishing. This leads to discussion of a variety of topics, including: the way American churches tend to fragment (!), evangelical labels in the UK, homosexuality, 'instant' Christianity, divorce and singleness, death and healing, tongue-speaking and the Holy Spirit, Christian fridge-door magnets, and a satire on the Toronto blessing.
The biblical content is very thin, the important things seem to be 'compassion rather than rightness' (page 117) and 'a genuine involvement with Jesus' (page 18). The spectacles of Scripture seem to have been replaced by 'honesty' as the focus for understanding life's riddles and heartaches.
I was left with the opinion that the characters lacked reality, and so the observations lacked depth. Some of it was funny, and when I read about the death of Brad's mother I was quite moved - but then I felt the same way watching 'The Lion King'.
Very light reading, which I was not very taken with.
