this book manages to be simple yet complex, light yet dense, all as inexplicable as the titular character themselves. i have a hard time pinning what it is about this book that kept me reading, but i'll try my best to explain it.

the premise is that in a small town, a stranger spends the night in the church and is discovered the next morning. they do not know anything about their identity, and so, the town dubs them "pew." they can't place pew's gender, race, age, anything, and their identity becomes slippery, reflecting back the town's own insecurities. pew themselves is the narrator of the story, which makes it even more interesting given the nature of their ambiguity.

there are multiple allusions to other things going on, whether that be a string of disappearances or an annual ritual that the town takes part in. there are also a number of themes interlaced throughout the book, whether that be about race, otherness, religion and the limits of belief, white guilt, hypocrisy, or community. 

however, my main issue with the book itself is that in theory, i like the book and what it's trying to do. however, in practice, the experience of reading it was less than stellar. i love thinking about the idea of the book and what the book was trying to do, but i did not enjoy the execution as much. because of that, i finally settled on three stars as my rating.