The Latest Epistle of Jim

Reverend Jack Andrews, pastor of a church in a small midwestern town, receives a letter from a large urban church that may contain a job offer, but postpones opening the letter and reflects on his past life while going through a typical day

Fifty-eight-year-old James Mason Andrews, minister of the nondenominational New Sharon church, is among the final four candidates for the post of senior pastor of the large, prestigious Epiphany Church. The position comes to represent everything Andrews and his wife, Kate, believe is his due: wider recognition, power, money, escape from small-town living and a home of their own after decades of parsonage life. While awaiting word, Andrews reflects on his life and work, accepting his faults and refusing to apologize for his pride and ambition (dirty words in the clergy); for his biases (among them a distaste for "clerical showboating"); his self-doubt; and his occasional lapses of faith, in which he'd dub God the Supreme Joker or even the Supreme Bumbler?suspecting "that the Power had gone awry." Shepard, an ordained minister and published poet, renders Andrews so human, he is instantly recognizable as everyman?fraught with frailties and continuously battling one or another of the seven deadly sins. We not only identify with Andrews but also understand his insecurities, wince at his pain and yearn for his appointment to Epiphany, a name not lost on Andrews or the reader. Written with abundant wit and sly humor, The Latest Epistle of Jim (winner of the 1995 Mid-List Press First Series Award for a Novel) offers remarkable insight into the internal workings of both the ministry ("a demanding and sometimes heartbreaking profession") and its servants while providing a rich story about the true meaning of faith as well.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

An old-fashioned debut, winner of Mid-List's national contest for first novels. Shepard's tale turns on a letter the Reverend Jack Andrews, pastor of a liberal church in a small midwestern town, receives in the morning mail but can't bring himself to open immediately. The letter is from the search committee of a much larger urban church and may contain a job offer. Shepard builds great suspense with this simple device, holding the reader's interest as Jack goes through the rounds of a typical day, officiating at the funeral of an elderly parishioner, stopping at the wake, all the while thinking back over his life. We learn of the disappointment his choice of a vocation caused his parents, of the bright hopes his wife had for her own career and of the way, in the small town in which they settle, those hopes have been stifled, while at the same time the decline of liberal denominations in general has also affected Jack's career. Jack, it becomes clear, is a good man, but afflicted with doubts. He had a brief, almost accidental affair long ago, and, though no one ever learned of it, it shook his faith to its foundations. So even though he is a careful pastor for his small flock and is generally liked, he also feels himself to be a hollow man, the central issue of his faith unresolved. The job in the big city would allow him to close out his career with the appearance of success, and his wife desperately wants to make the move as well. Good news comes by phone, bad news in another letter. Shepard masterfully manages events so that the reader is kept guessing, up to the climax, about the contents of the letter. The author, a minister himself, has created convincing, exact portraits of both Jack's life and of the little town of New Sharon. A fine, absorbing character study, modestly rendered but deeply felt. -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.