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Reviewed by Paul Zietsman for Readers' Favorite
The Attenuating Puritan by Robert McGuiness is a work of satire that makes the reader wince, or at times laugh somewhat uncomfortably at the state of mental illness, industrial contaminants, and other factors affecting modern day America. A man who has likely suffered from bipolar manic depression or schizoaffective disorder from a young age, attributed to environmental toxins, travels the land to drink holy water, which is laden with heavy metals, under the delusion that he is saving or attenuating humanity. During his travels, a tracking device is planted in his robe, and a website starts tracking his movements, offering rewards for the most degrading photos and stories of him. At first, he is ridiculed but is later praised as a prophet who has brought the American consumerism machine under greater scrutiny, including large, well-known pharmaceutical companies.
The Attenuating Puritan, while being deeply satirical, also has elements of a classical tragedy: the virtue of the protagonist to drink the world's poison as an act of devotion is the very thing destroying him. Yet, unlike classical tragedy, which ends in recognition and release, this one does not even grant the hero that; there is no catharsis, only recursion. I found the dark comedy hilarious at times, even though one might argue that humor is not the point, but rather a symptom of the narrator's or the narrative's dissociation. Not only are consumerism, environmental hazards, and the status quo of political parties brought under scrutiny, but Robert McGuiness also makes the reader think about an individual's battle with mental illness, refusing to let us settle comfortably into reading. The reader is asked if the protagonist is a prophet bringing healing to a lost and loathsome world, or is he indeed an untreated psychotic with delusions of grandeur.
