Cross On Me
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"Dazzling. Breathtaking. "Cross on Me" is the most captivating book I've read since Helprin's "Memoir from Antproof Case." I want to follow Qoe to the rim of the universe."
- Nate Larkin
Author of Samson and the Pirate Monks |
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Cross On Me - A NovelRead the first 50 pages (177kb PDF)"IN THE FINAL DECADE of the twentieth century the humanities spiraled into an unprecedented crisis. Those fields of inquiry that have always been our most believed mirrors felt their fundaments dissolve and their authorities wane. Although the common masses have no idea, and academics are in no hurry to tell them, mankind is either irreparably mad and ultimately doomed, or going through an awakening on an apocalyptic scale. Right now, in this first decade of the new millennium, we are either dying or giving birth." |
ETHEL MEYER, a retired literature professor who is rapidly going blind, decides to invest her final moments of vision into the raving manuscripts of QOHELETH "QOE" BOGENHEART, a young Bostonian scientist/theologian who lost his mind while writing it. With the help of mathematical science and industrial capital, Ethel forms the handwritten loose ends into the unity that they intended to convey: the continuously changing mind of Qoe, who looks back and ahead, and endures the present.
As we follow Qoe on his Bunyanesque voyage from Boston to the arctic shore of Alaska we begin to wonder why any man would deliberately seek to forgo his sanity. Could it possibly be to emulate Abraham who left his home, or perhaps even Christ who gave His life?
Qoe meets fellow travelers, suffers hallucinations, and even attempts to mug God with a baseball bat. Why is he obsessed with flight? Is he searching for gold or knowledge? Who is Anna? Where is he going?
Qoe's car is found abandoned in Skagway, Alaska, and the manuscript ends in determinative silence. Ethel is nevertheless convinced that the story should continue, and the only one who may be able to raise Qoe is his wealthy father Karel. Only when his monetary fortune appears to have no bearing on his mission, Karel begins to realize that to raise a person, one has to live his death. Coming to terms with the nature of reality, Karel embraces his son's plight and the howling infinite of fiction.
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[Uittenbogaard has] an amazing command of vocabulary and sensitivity to character and to subtleties in expression as well.
Mary Sterner Lawson, Ph.D., author of
June Bugs Grocery and the Cornfield Jook: A South Albany Oral History. [Cross On Me] is intriguing and philosophical.
Benjamin S. Lawson Ph.D.
Professor, Department of English and Modern Languages, Albany State University, Albany, Georgia |
Arie Uittenbogaard
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Very well written. Wildly creative. A fun read.
Judith St. Pierre, Ph.d.
Editor Even in draft form, this novel shows challenge and promise.
Dee Longenbaugh The Observatory,
Juneau, Alaska Praise for other work by AU: Exceedingly well written.
Joel M. Hoffman, PhD
Author of In The Beginning |
