Lamb

The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal

By: Christopher Moore

Narrated by: Fisher Stevens

Length: 15 hrs and 20 mins

Publisher's summary

The birth of Jesus has been well chronicled, as have his glorious teachings, acts, and divine sacrifice after his 30th birthday. But no one knows about the early life of the Son of God, the missing years - except Biff, the Messiah's best bud, who has been resurrected to tell the story in this divinely hilarious yet heartfelt work, "reminiscent of Vonnegut and Douglas Adams" ( Philadelphia Inquirer).

Verily, the story Biff has to tell is a miraculous one, filled with remarkable journeys, magic, healings, kung fu, corpse reanimations, demons, and hot babes. Even the considerable wiles and devotion of the Savior's pal may not be enough to divert Joshua from his tragic destiny. But there's no one who loves Josh more (except maybe "Maggie," Mary of Magdalan) and Biff isn't about to let his extraordinary pal suffer and ascend without a fight.

©2002 Christopher Moore (P)2007 HarperCollins Publishers

Critic reviews

"Moore...gets style points for his wild imagination as Biff recalls his journey with Jesus...into and out of the clutches of Balthasar, then into a Buddhist monastery in China and finally off to India, where they dabble in the spiritual and erotic aspects of Hinduism. The author gets more serious in his climax, offering a relatively straightforward, heartfelt account of the Passion and Christ's final days that includes an intriguing spin on how the Resurrection might have happened." (Publishers Weekly)
"An instant classic...terrific, funny, and poignant." (Rocky Mountain News)

irrevernt but not disrespectful

If fart jokes offend you, this is not the book for you. If the idea of a young Christ laughing at a fart joke offends you, this book is definitely not for you.

If you are open to an alternative view of the Messiah, and a how He came of age in the company of his sarcastic, libidinous, and totally devoted friend, you will love this book.

Narrator Fisher Stevens does an excellent job, and, in my opinon, is on the short list for "Best.Narrator.Ever."

Very funny and NEARLY blasphemous

"Lamb" is the product of a fertile mind. When I think about a book like this, I always wonder most about how anyone could think of writing it. Here we have a (roughly) historical account of the life of Christ told through different and VERY irreverent eyes in such a way that would likely make a fundamentalist explode but possibly make an unbeliever think "Christ is cool." Christopher Moore takes New Testament facts, throws in some of the wilder beliefs about what He did between ages 13 and 30, and then resurrects (literally) a childhood pal to tell the tale. Wow.

This is a highly enjoyable book. I don't think it's blasphemous, but it does walk right up to the line.

If you aren't convinced, then let me just give you two reasons to listen to it:
1) You get to hear the very revealing comments from two blind men after getting their sight back. Amazing.
2) You (finally) find out why bunnies are a part of Easter.

Good but not the laugh riot I wanted

This is my second Christoper Moore book and while I did enjoy it, it was not the laugh riot I wanted. There were several good parts that really cracked me up, but realize you know how this is gonna end, after all, we are talking about Jesus and his friend Biff. Also, if you are very religious... not so sure you would like it, makes fun of a few issues, that are pretty amusing if you ask me. Lets just say, Josh likes bacon. All in all though, I would recommend it, though maybe not as your first Christopher Moore book.

Get over BIff and enjoy the story

It does not matter if you are a very religious person, you just need to enjoy sarcasm and a good laugh with Lamb.

Christopher Moore creates a wholly (holy?) believable character that grew up with Jesus as a child and became his best friend. As most bible stories go, there are a lot of missing years between the birth of Jesus and the events leading up to his being hung on the cross. This book covers all those missing years from the perspective of his friend Biff.The book does an excellent job of explaining why Biff never shows up in any bibles but I won't give that little tidbit away.

Lamb is a pretty sweeping novel that covers a lot of ground (literally) and shows how a young Jesus (pronounced Joshua at the time) learned to be the messiah by traveling for years to meet each of the three wise men. While the book is laugh-out-loud funny at times, there was never a moment I felt Christopher Moore was trying to poke fun at religion.

Fisher Steven's was perfect as the narrator and did such an excellent job I was sad when the book ended. The characters were all fully developed and never forced.

This was a great book and I highly recommend it.

Funny & Enlightening

I read this book a year ago and laughed and sniggered aloud ...throughout! I Loved It! When I was looking for a light and entertaining listen I was so excited to see that this was on audio.

I completely subscribe to this fictional idea and like to think that JC did have a buddy like Biff!

One of my favorite books

I've loved this book for years, and really enjoyed having it with me while driving and walking around. There's a weird glitch that I've never heard on any other audiobook, though, in which none of the chapters end with a second to land; the next chapter is announced in what seems like the same breath. It's an unfortunate distraction. I also thought that Fisher Stevens could have worked a little harder on his Chinese accent; it's borderline offensive. Otherwise, the rest of his characterizations are solid, and he represents the humor and pathos of the plot well.

This was a perfect Easter read

I just loved this.
The humor was exactly what I needed, and this is a topic that I constantly have rolling around in my head. Human nature being what it is, it stands to reason that Jesus had a best friend who was an asshole. I love it.

This is my favorite book on tape

I have listened to it no less than 15 times. It’s a masterpiece. The narrator is so well matched with the author, and the Lamb is about as good a book as you could ever hope to find.

Best Narration!

I’ve read this book before, and I thoroughly enjoyed the audio version. The narration was the best of any audiobook I’ve listened to!

I liked it, but I didn't love it.

What did you love best about Lamb?

It is well written. The characters are easy to relate to. However, it's rarely laugh out loud funny. I think I will stick to humorists and comedians to get my laughs out of audio books. I just don't find fiction to be that funny.