Somehow we missed sharing Darrell Schweitzer’s glowing review of James Morrow’s THE MADONNA AND THE STARSHIP from the September, 2014 issue of THE NEW YORK REVIEW OF SCIENCE FICTION.

Morrow’s latest comedy is by his standards rather light- weight, closer to Shambling Towards Hiroshima than The Last Witchfinder, but it is still, as is to be expected, a work of wit and substance, quite entertaining of itself and intriguing for the possible shifts (or further developments) it shows in Morrow’s attitudes toward religion. He is, after all, the author who once described the earthly life and martyrdom of Jesus Christ’s kid sister Julie (in Only Begotten Daughter, 1990) and then put God himself on trial for crimes against humanity (Blameless in Abaddon, 1996). You might say Morrow has made a career out of blasphemy. He has been called America’s Salman Rushdie.

But he is not so simple a writer as that. Like any good satirist, he knows that the next step is to turn his previous premise on its head.

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The book may be great fun, but it also delivers something important to think about.

Read the rest of Schweitzer’s review in the September, 2014 issue of THE NEW YORK REVIEW OF SCIENCE FICTION.

For more on THE MADONNA AND THE STARSHIP, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover and design by Elizabeth Story.