Drops Like Stars

June 8, 2009
While Bell's books Velvet Elvis
and Sex God
received generally strong reviews, this effort to understand the relationship between suffering and creativity feels superficial and overly self-conscious. Few readers will dispute Bell's gentle assertions: that life can be extremely difficult and capricious, that it is often difficult to find God amid suffering, that suffering has a great potential to unify disparate people, and that great bursts of creative energy can arise from pain. Bell explores these issues not by covert biblical exegesis—which was a surprising and welcome highlight of Velvet Elvis
—but new-fashioned storytelling. Bell weaves inspiring stories of people who turned their suffering into something transformative, and many of these stories are memorable. They are certainly accessible: Bell draws from fiction, movies, real-life situations and his own life. These anecdotes do not make a book, however, and Bell's spare prose lacks original insights into age-old theodicy questions. Although the design and layout are first-rate, $35 is a lot of money for a 160-page book that is mostly white space.