Me of Little Faith

The celebrated crank lets his guard down.
Lewis Black has made a career out of being the angriest, most cynical guy in the room, the man so frustrated and frazzled by the stupidity of the world his whole body shakes. So it might be alarming, if not downright disillusioning, to find Black’s famous nihilism wavering, at least when he describes his early years. Me of Little Faith is an almost-sincere spiritual journey, wherein Black relates real-life brushes with higher and unexplainable powers. When all is said and done we’re left with a more well-rounded picture of our anti-hero. He’s a man who’s tried many drugs and examined a number of religious possibilities — has some choice words for Jews, Catholics, Mormons, televangelists, fortune-tellers and the dimestore guru he once meditated with — who’s suddenly comfortable letting his guard down long enough to drop in some real-life pathos between all those easy cracks about evangelical wackos and ex-wives. And yet, somehow, he comes away from that journey and this book no weaker and no less ironclad in his belief in disbelieving. It’s a miracle!