Are miracles a thing? Ask a secular humanist, then ask someone more pious for two different but equally definitive answers. Ask Arthur, the narrator of God and Sex, Jon Raymond's easygoing assumption challenger of a novel, and the answer is more nuanced. One expects nuance from Raymond (Freebird), co-screenwriter of many Kelly Reichardt films, including Wendy and Lucy and First Cow. In this novel, 40-ish Arthur is the author of four "spirituality-cum-science" books that fared poorly. The last one's failure plunged him into such a "cauldron of self-doubt" that he moved back to his childhood home in Oregon. But he has an idea for a fifth work, "a small, lyrical book in praise of trees." He meets Phil French, a forest ecologist, who helps him with research. Their friendship develops a wrinkle: Arthur falls for Phil's wife, Sarah, a high school librarian.
The inevitability of Arthur and Sarah's affair is as fraught as one might expect, but it gets even more complicated when Sarah leaves for a weeklong mindfulness retreat at Mount Hood. An environmental disaster forces nonbeliever Arthur to pray for a beneficial outcome. Therein lies the richness of this quietly intense novel. What begins as a conventional domestic drama reaches greater heights as Raymond explores important themes, including environmental degradation, climate change, infidelity, the agony of artistic creation, and the concept of faith. Raymond's light touch makes what could have been heavy-handed moralizing instead a gently thrilling meditation on life and virtue. --Michael Magras, freelance book reviewer