How might we behave in the dark hold of Noah's ark?

"The Preservationist" by David Maine; St. Martin's, hardback, $21.95

By Connie Ogle
Knight Ridder News Service

Genesis makes it sound easy: Gather wood and animals. Build a big boat. Wait for rain. When the floodwaters recede, replenish mankind, and give thanks.

But in David Maine's debut novel, a reimagining of the story of Noah and the Ark, the process is not so simple. Noe, as he's called here, receives God's message, but there are issues: Where to find wood. How to collect creatures from far-flung kingdoms. How to prevent them from eating each other. And — more important than you'd care to imagine — how to clean up after them once the boat is afloat.

Maine builds a surprisingly touching story with impudent humor. Noe's tale, which is really about man's need for belief, is defiantly seaworthy. Like the ark, it floats true and strong, with imagination for ballast and sharp language as its rudder.

What it might be like in the dark hold of the ark, wood creaking, animals muttering, humans shivering? Maine puts us in uncomfortable proximity to the question of faith itself. Where might we be and how might we behave if the world ended?