![]() First edition | |
Author | Giacomo Sartori |
---|---|
Original title | Sono Dio [1] |
Translator | Frederika Randall [2] |
Language | Italian |
Genre | Satire, comedy, epistolary [3] |
Publication date | 1 May 2016 [4] |
Publication place | Italy |
Published in English | 5 February 2019 [5] |
ISBN | 9781632062147 |
I Am God, originally published as Sono Dio, is an Italian novel by Giacomo Sartori about the Abrahamic God falling in love with a mortal woman. First published in 2016 and translated into English by Frederika Randall in 2019, [2] it was a critical and commercial success.
I Am God opens with God beginning to keep a journal about his view on modern society, and in particular his infatuation with Daphne, a young geneticist. Daphne, an atheist post-punk and anti-Catholic activist, attracts God's attention although he fails to understand why. [3] Much of the book is epistolary, with God as a first-person narrator through his journal, discussing his thoughts on a humanity he finds unsatisfying; language is recent to him, as the God of the novel has mostly disclaimed and damned humanity on the basis of thinking human language and thought to be evil. [6] The plot also features a love triangle between Daphne, God, and her mortal boyfriend Giovanni, an alcoholic and sexually uninhibited paleontologist. [7]
The God of I Am God has been characterized as neurotic, garrulous, and overly verbose. [8] He also holds conservative views on matters of gender and sexuality, being called "half heteronormative deity, half embarrassing uncle" by Martin Riker of The New York Times. [3]
I Am God received mostly positive reviews. Michael Alec Rose of BookPage described the novel as "delightful, strikingly current, [and] infectiously readable" and compared Sartori to great historical Italian religious artists such as Michelangelo and Dante Alighieri, saying "in his modest and profound way, Sartori belongs in this terrific company". [1] R. P. Finch of The Philadelphia Inquirer called it "a pleasure to read", but criticized the plot for being overly complex, [6] while Publishers Weekly referred to it as "an immensely satisfying feat of imagination". [7] James Livingston of The New Republic wrote a particularly in-depth review, interpreting I Am God as a meditation on the human focus on death and mortality, concepts alien to an immortal deity. [8]
Kirkus Reviews and The New York Times both gave more mixed reviews. Kirkus criticized the book for lacking sharpness and for what it interpreted as homophobic content, [5] while The New York Times, while overall positive, found the characters to be overly simplistic and the humour perhaps weakened by translation. [3]
Italian reviewers were also positive about Sono Dio, the original Italian novel. Gabriele Sabatini of Flaneri praised the novel for its sense of spirit and vigour, [9] while Stefano Zangrando of L'Indice dei libri del mese endorsed the humour and prose. [10]