God, No! by Penn Jillette, Simon & Schuster, 231 pages (published today)

Penn Jillette is half the comedy-magic act, Penn & Teller.

God, No! is full of real-life stories, some of them exuberantly pornographic. It doesn’t tell you how the magic tricks are done, or even describe any, but it does tell you a lot about Penn Jillette.

In the entertainment industry there may be many atheists, but few say they are. Penn Jillette does, and for that we applaud him.

We know there are very few stars of stage, screen and television who are not lefties. Penn Jillette is one of the few, and for that too we applaud him.

He states plainly and emphatically what he means.

Reading the Bible is the fast track to atheism.

There is no god and that’s the simple truth.

You have to make it clear to everyone, including your children, that there is no god.

It’s amazing to me how many people think that voting to have the government take money by force through taxes to give poor people money is compassion.

Atheism was a real comfort to me when my mother and sister died. … I could never have understood suffering as part of an all-powerful god’s “plan”.

There is a world of safety in doubt. The respect for faith, the celebration of faith, is dangerous. It’s faith itself that’s wrong.

One of the stories is about an orthodox Jew who loses his faith. With Penn’s assistance he orders, and much enjoys, his first non-kosher meal. But not yet being comfortable with his atheism he asks himself, “Who will take care of me?”

Another new atheist says: “For me the biggest part of letting go of god was holding myself accountable for my own actions… It felt safer to be a passenger in my own life than to take the wheel.”

Perhaps with time, experience, and Penn’s influence, those two came to feel as excited as Penn himself clearly is to be responsible for themselves, as happy as he is to be free.