Kyle A. Massa

Egg is not a penguin although at the start of the book, I assumed that she was. She's just a teenager who loves to write. Her mom is a religious fanatic, who travels the world spreading her religion. Egg doesn't believe in religion, so she writes a satire. (Which makes the book somewhat meta: a book satirizing religion in which one of the characters writes a satire of religion). While Egg's book is a main character in and of itself, the reader only learns the its plot at the very end of the novel. The main character of Egg's book is the Almighty Penguin, and people love her book so much that they start a new religion called Penguinism.

Before this, there was only one religion in the world. People worshiped the Ageless: 12 major deities (the "Dozen") and numerous lesser deities (the "Lesser"). But these so called gods - like those of Greco-Roman mythology - are little more than overpowered humans. Other than their (assumed) immortality, the Ageless are no different from humans. In fact, they are less awe inspiring than an average righteous person, since they are entirely self absorbed. Even their divine jobs (such as riding the sun across the sky) can actually be performed by a mortal (and they later are).

I'm not sure whether the book is intended as mainly fiction or if it's meant to teach a lesson. The lesson is nothing life changing, and its entirely predictable since the primary conflict in most of the book is between the followers of the Ageless and the followers of Penguinism, with the addition of a warmongering king set on murdering the Ageless to replace them. "Two armies, both fighting for opposing religions, united only by their blindness." This description of the novel sounds like it would be boring. After all, in the real world, it's annoying when people badger you with their religious convictions, trying to convert you. But the characters are interesting and Egg is relatable. The book alternates between several third-person limited narrators, and it is written in a casual, familiar style. This works well when Egg is the narrator, since she comes across as a child herself. The familiar writing (ex: "the sack magically reduced the load, but it was still super heavy.") is a little tiring when other, more regal, characters are the narrator.… (meer)