I enjoyed reading this book - Hitchens does reasonable job of debunking some
of the major tenets of the major religions such as Christianity, Judaism,
Islam and Buddhism. He is pretty even handed they all get a pounding.
However, the book does come across as somewhat mean-spirited: figures such as
Mother Theresa and the Dalai Llama who most people would consider highly
moral, peaceful and caring irrespective of their religion get their share of
abuse too. On one hand you can’t accuse Hitchens of pulling his punches on the
other I wonder if such an approach is likely to alienate people.
Like Richard Dawkins appears to have become, Hitchens seems just as rabid in
his hatred of religion as any of the worst sort of religious fanatic - in my
opinion he’s not doing himself any favours in this regard.