text: Having recently graduated with a BA in English, I am forever doomed to read such so-called "truth texts" with what could only be called an eye for detail; does the author site her sources?  Credentials?  Any sort of solid evidence as to why I, as her reader, should believe a word of what she says?
  The answer is, simply, no.
  Ms. Cumbey quotes other texts by other zealotous fundamentalists, to be sure.  However, the credentials of these people remain a mystery.  Anyone can write a book, and anyone with enough money can get it published.  Had I the funds, I could write a "revealing, riveting best seller" on the nature of human genomes and cloning and my opinions of the matter; throw in a few quotes by people who may or may not sound like they know what they're talking about, and there you go.  The point is, my knowledge of such topics is sorely limited, as is Ms. Cumbey's research.  Yet somehow a book that would never earn a passing grade in a collegiate literature course for lack of research and depth of understanding is littering our shelves.  Well, I'm baffled
  