What I Really Think of You

Quiet and deep-thinking Opal Ringer is the daughter of Brother Royal Ringer, who leads a flock of hard-on-their-luck Pentecostalists at The Helping Hand Tabernacle. Brother Ringer isn't exactly a snake-handler, but he does at one point employ the services of a leg-lengthening healer to increase attendance at his revival series. Jesse Pegler is the second (and less-favored) son of millionaire televangelist Guy Pegler. Though Guy Pegler's background is strikingly similar to that of Brother Ringer, he promotes a more prosperous theology:"Jesus wants you to win, and so do I!" Jesse Pegler's older brother, Bud,has run away and left an ill-suited Jesse as heir apparent to the throne. Opal and Jesse eventually meet and attempt to establish a relationship. Before they can successfully connect with anyone else, however, each must come to terms with his/her own identity crisis and feelings of religious confusion. Other intriguing characters appear. Dianne Young-Cheek, the misfit daughter of one of Seaville's wealthiest couples, becomes romantically linked with Bobby-John, Opal's tormented older brother. Donald Divine, Guy Pegler's somewhat slimy promoter, is preposterous. Seal von Henning, a former girlfriend of runaway brother Bud, provides a link between many of the story's characters. Healer K. Christian Keck, though only a bit-part character, is so realistic that he wouldn't be in any way out of place on one of the charismatic healing programs playing on cable today. The characters I found most likable, in addition to the main characters of Opal and Jesse, were their mothers, Arnelle Ringer and Rhoda Pegler. Though Arnelle, as the wife of a Pentecostal preacher, is mostly compelled to spout the party line, she understands the angst of Opal's deprivation, compelled by both economic and religious constraints. Although Rhoda Pegler has to some degree given in to the worldly pleasures available to the very wealthy, neither has she entirely forgotten her more humble roots. On more than one occasion she finds it necessary to remind her husband of his as well. Those who are interested in non-mainline Protestantism, or at least are not totally put off by it, will thoroughly enjoy this book. The off-beat characters and strange plot twist make this a memorable story.