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The Cape Breton Trilogy #2
The Bishop's Man
Something about the boat, perhaps its name, and the posture of that boy caused me to defer my anxieties for the moment. It was so rare to see someone that age stationary, somber. I was more accustomed to a rowdy adolescent enthusiasm. This young man, I realized, was exceptional only because of time and place. Maybe any one of them in those circumstances would have been the same. Quiet. But he caught my attention nevertheless and linked the moment to tender places in the memory. Doomed boys and in retrospect they all have that stillness.
--from The Bishop’s Man by Linden MacIntyre
The year is 1993 and Father Duncan MacAskill stands at a small Cape Breton fishing harbour a few miles from where he grew up. Enjoying the timeless sight of a father and son piloting a boat, Duncan takes a moment’s rest from his worries. But he does not yet know that his already strained faith is about to be tested by his interactions with a troubled boy, 18-year-old Danny MacKay.
Known to fellow priests as the “Exorcist” because of his special role as clean-up man for the Bishop of Antigonish, Duncan has a talent for coolly reassigning deviant priests while ensuring minimal fuss from victims and their families. It has been a lonely vocation, but Duncan is generally satisfied that his work is a necessary defense of the church. All this changes when lawyers and a policeman snoop too close for the bishop’s comfort. Duncan is assigned a parish in the remote Cape Breton community of Creignish and told to wait it out.
This is not the first time Duncan has been sent away for knowing too decades ago, the displeased bishop sent a more idealistic Duncan to Honduras for voicing suspicions about a revered priest. It was there that Duncan first tasted forbidden love, with the beautiful Jacinta. It was also there that he met the courageous Father Alfonso, who taught him more about spiritual devotion than he had ever known back home. But when an act of violence in Honduras shook Duncan to his core, he returned home a changed man, willing to quietly execute the bishop’s commands.
Now, decades later in Cape Breton, Duncan claims to his concerned sister Effie that isolation is his preference. But when several women seek to befriend him, along with some long-estranged friends, Duncan is alternately tempted and unnerved by their attentions. Drink becomes his only solace.
Attempting to distract himself with parish work, Duncan takes an interest in troubled young Danny, whose good-hearted father sells Duncan a boat he names The Jacinta . To Duncan’s alarm, he discovers that the boy once spent time with an errant priest who had been dispatched by Duncan himself to Port Hood. Duncan begins to ask questions, dreading the answers. When tragedy strikes, he knows that he must act. But will his actions be those of a good priest, or an all too flawed man?
Winner of the 2009 Scotiabank Giller Prize, Linden MacIntyre’s searing The Bishop’s Man is an unforgettable and complex character study of a deeply conflicted man at the precipice of his life. Can we ever be certain of an individual’s guilt or innocence? Is violence ever justified? Can any act of contrition redeem our own complicity?
--from The Bishop’s Man by Linden MacIntyre
The year is 1993 and Father Duncan MacAskill stands at a small Cape Breton fishing harbour a few miles from where he grew up. Enjoying the timeless sight of a father and son piloting a boat, Duncan takes a moment’s rest from his worries. But he does not yet know that his already strained faith is about to be tested by his interactions with a troubled boy, 18-year-old Danny MacKay.
Known to fellow priests as the “Exorcist” because of his special role as clean-up man for the Bishop of Antigonish, Duncan has a talent for coolly reassigning deviant priests while ensuring minimal fuss from victims and their families. It has been a lonely vocation, but Duncan is generally satisfied that his work is a necessary defense of the church. All this changes when lawyers and a policeman snoop too close for the bishop’s comfort. Duncan is assigned a parish in the remote Cape Breton community of Creignish and told to wait it out.
This is not the first time Duncan has been sent away for knowing too decades ago, the displeased bishop sent a more idealistic Duncan to Honduras for voicing suspicions about a revered priest. It was there that Duncan first tasted forbidden love, with the beautiful Jacinta. It was also there that he met the courageous Father Alfonso, who taught him more about spiritual devotion than he had ever known back home. But when an act of violence in Honduras shook Duncan to his core, he returned home a changed man, willing to quietly execute the bishop’s commands.
Now, decades later in Cape Breton, Duncan claims to his concerned sister Effie that isolation is his preference. But when several women seek to befriend him, along with some long-estranged friends, Duncan is alternately tempted and unnerved by their attentions. Drink becomes his only solace.
Attempting to distract himself with parish work, Duncan takes an interest in troubled young Danny, whose good-hearted father sells Duncan a boat he names The Jacinta . To Duncan’s alarm, he discovers that the boy once spent time with an errant priest who had been dispatched by Duncan himself to Port Hood. Duncan begins to ask questions, dreading the answers. When tragedy strikes, he knows that he must act. But will his actions be those of a good priest, or an all too flawed man?
Winner of the 2009 Scotiabank Giller Prize, Linden MacIntyre’s searing The Bishop’s Man is an unforgettable and complex character study of a deeply conflicted man at the precipice of his life. Can we ever be certain of an individual’s guilt or innocence? Is violence ever justified? Can any act of contrition redeem our own complicity?
399 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2009
87 people are currently reading
2822 people want to read
About the author
Linden MacIntyre
15 books186 followersLinden MacIntyre is the co-host of the fifth estate and the winner of nine Gemini Awards for broadcast journalism. His most recent book, a boyhood memoir called Causeway: A Passage from Innocence won both the Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction and the Evelyn Richardson Prize for Non-Fiction.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 534 reviews
April 30, 2023
"Scandal, Duncan. This is about scandal.”
Duncan MacAskill is a complex, pious, undoubtedly well-intentioned but deeply flawed and weak-willed man. For his own reasons (in hindsight, reasons as flawed and as misguided as his personality) he chose a life as a Roman Catholic priest and found himself exiled, to a temporary posting shall we say off the beaten track and safely away from probing journalists, in Central America when he wouldn’t disavow and recant his knowledge of another priest’s sexual abuse of a young member of his flock. Cooling his heels away from clerical supervision allowed him to succumb to his corporal weaknesses, the temptations of the flesh and the bottle. Upon his return to Canada, his administrative isolation continued with a posting as the pastor to a small urban parish on Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia. MacAskill then struggles mightily with the certain knowledge that the suicide of one of his young parishioners was a direct result of the young man’s mental struggles with the abuse he had suffered at the hands of one of MacAskill’s fellow priests.
The self-assured and utterly evil self-righteousness of the bishop in his absolute certainty that the church must be protected from the negative publicity of priests being tempted by preying children who have somehow become sexualized before their time is breathtaking in its depth and ugliness. But even such a brilliant portrayal as that cannot save THE BISHOP’S MAN from becoming lost in its single-minded pursuit of an ill-defined version of literary excellence. For my money – and I’m only a single reader, of course – THE BISHOP’S MAN would have been a much more rewarding read if it had been a little more direct in its prognostications, its analysis and vilification of the evils of the Roman Catholic Church, and a little more linear in the development of the story and the history.
A powerful novel, to be sure, but not easy to read and even more difficult to enjoy.
Paul Weiss
Duncan MacAskill is a complex, pious, undoubtedly well-intentioned but deeply flawed and weak-willed man. For his own reasons (in hindsight, reasons as flawed and as misguided as his personality) he chose a life as a Roman Catholic priest and found himself exiled, to a temporary posting shall we say off the beaten track and safely away from probing journalists, in Central America when he wouldn’t disavow and recant his knowledge of another priest’s sexual abuse of a young member of his flock. Cooling his heels away from clerical supervision allowed him to succumb to his corporal weaknesses, the temptations of the flesh and the bottle. Upon his return to Canada, his administrative isolation continued with a posting as the pastor to a small urban parish on Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia. MacAskill then struggles mightily with the certain knowledge that the suicide of one of his young parishioners was a direct result of the young man’s mental struggles with the abuse he had suffered at the hands of one of MacAskill’s fellow priests.
The self-assured and utterly evil self-righteousness of the bishop in his absolute certainty that the church must be protected from the negative publicity of priests being tempted by preying children who have somehow become sexualized before their time is breathtaking in its depth and ugliness. But even such a brilliant portrayal as that cannot save THE BISHOP’S MAN from becoming lost in its single-minded pursuit of an ill-defined version of literary excellence. For my money – and I’m only a single reader, of course – THE BISHOP’S MAN would have been a much more rewarding read if it had been a little more direct in its prognostications, its analysis and vilification of the evils of the Roman Catholic Church, and a little more linear in the development of the story and the history.
A powerful novel, to be sure, but not easy to read and even more difficult to enjoy.
Paul Weiss
January 24, 2011
A quick and gut-reaction 5 stars. It took me at least half-way through to figure out what he was doing, and to shed the preconceptions of what I thought this book was going to be. The last 10050 pages are masterful.
_______________________
[later]
This turned out to be a different novel, a better novel, than the one I was expecting. I know Linden MacIntyre as a journalist, and knew this was about the sex abuse scandals in the Catholic Church. So I expected a journalistic exploration of that topic in novel form. Sorry, Mr. MacIntyre; I misunderestimated you.
This is a novel about damaged people, damaged communication, and the personally destructive power of secrets. It's about loneliness and isolation, and what that does to people. (And strangely enough, it's the third novel I've read, three of three in 2011, that touches directly or indirectly on orphan-dom. I don't really know what that means, but I am the granddaughter of an orphan, and my father was powerfully affected by that, so there's definitely something going on here).
This novel is also about coming from a place – metaphorical, physical – that is defined by poverty, trauma and addiction. A place where everyone is related to everyone (who’s yer fadder? or in this case, who's yer mudder?), but there is little intimacy and little meaningful communication or connection between people. There can't be, because there are such huge gaps in self-knowledge and so many secrets.
The poverty is not just because of a changing way of life that leads people "away" (and priests astray) and leaves those left behind with little to hope for. It is a poverty of spirit built from layers of emptiness that have been laid down over generations as each deals with its own secrets, and most die with them unexorcised.
And it's about all kinds of trauma, all kinds of addiction – personal bedevilment that extends far beyond the priesthood. And yes, it's about the sex scandals in the priesthood too. But these are put into a much broader and much more personal context.
It's also about what the priesthood is – why people enter it and how they struggle to define it for themselves. Beyond that, it's about how the scandals personally affect(ed) those of faith: the wrenching conflict between one's faith, one's trust in one man who represents that faith, and the truth.
What it's not is particularly atmospheric of Cape Breton; i.e., the external landscape of the place, although there are lots of descriptions of wind and rain/snow and cold and general bleakness, but these I feel are secondary and irrelevant. There’s a nod to the loss of Gaelic (and it’s important which character retains it, but I won’t spoil that here). I believe the loss of Gaelic is a metaphor for the loss of faith among these Cape Bretoners, whose island became a dumping ground for "bad" priests. The internal landscape of Cape Breton is well-told, although it's not a particularly flattering portrait.
Here's what I liked, loved even: this book didn't rest on pat explanations. It's too simple merely to say that the forced celibacy of the priesthood leads to aberrant sexual behaviour. Or, that damaged people are attracted to the priesthood, at which point they are damaged further. There is nothing particularly anti-Catholic here (at least, as a non-Catholic, I didn't think so; Catholics might disagree). On the contrary, it's a sensitive and searching portrayal of an issue, and the people involved in it, which respects not just the complexity of their faith but also their humanity.
MacIntyre does a great job of what is essentially a character portrait (more than one, in fact) of a flawed and complex human being who happens to be a priest. Father MacAskill starts as a brittle, weak, ineffective priest who knows little of himself or of dealing with the faithful, beyond performing a duty to the Mother Church that implicates him in the scandals. He degenerates from there. As he bottoms out and confronts his own demons, lo and behold – he becomes not only more human, but also a better priest. (And MacIntyre does a 1000 percent better job of that character arc than I just did, which is why he won the Giller, I'd say). :-p
Well. Anyway. MacIntyre’s thesis – if he can be said to have one – is that nothing is as simple as it seems, and that priests go awry, as all humans do, when they deny or repress – or never know – the truth about themselves.
This is also a portrayal of a crisis of faith not in terms of one man's attempt to understand his relationship to God, but to understand his relationship to himself, to his past and to his calling.
One other thing: most of the reviews I've read comment on the disjointed nature of the narrative structure, with its flashbacks and flash-forwards. You need to be patient with this, because while it's disorienting at first, it gets more cohesive as the plot unfolds (and in fact, I believe this is intentional. As Fr. MacAskill becomes whole, the threads of time are tied together, and the links between past, present and future start to make sense. It’s quite clever.)
Concurrent with that, the dialogue is also disorienting at first. Conversation seems to go nowhere, or seems to rely on some kind of implicit but unspoken understanding between characters to which the reader is not privy. People talk, but there are gaps in dialogue (lots unsaid, lots under the surface), and weird stops, starts and jumps to conclusions as jarring as the jumps back and forth in time. As Fr. MacAskill’s and others’ pasts are revealed, true understanding – connection, even intimacy – starts to emerge. And then, sensible dialogue begins. By the last 50 pages, as the timing and the dialogue become whole and rich, this novel starts to feel entirely worthy of the accolades and awards it won (which is to say that I think criticisms of inconsistency, a lack of sure-handedness or trickery with respect to managing the novel's narrative flow or dialogue miss the point).
In the last third of the book, one of its most interesting (at least to me) themes coalesces, as the dialogue – i.e., not what is said but what is not said – changes: secrets prevent communication which prevents intimacy. And that fundamental, very existential aloneness – beyond sexual to an all-encompassing kind of connection to oneself, one's past, one's roots and family, and one's vocation, not to mention to others – is at the root of dysfunction, dread and despair. (There are several interesting references to existentialism, and Fr. MacAskill himself reads Heidegger).
A powerful novel. Maybe not a complete 5, but let it stand for now.
_______________________
[later]
This turned out to be a different novel, a better novel, than the one I was expecting. I know Linden MacIntyre as a journalist, and knew this was about the sex abuse scandals in the Catholic Church. So I expected a journalistic exploration of that topic in novel form. Sorry, Mr. MacIntyre; I misunderestimated you.
This is a novel about damaged people, damaged communication, and the personally destructive power of secrets. It's about loneliness and isolation, and what that does to people. (And strangely enough, it's the third novel I've read, three of three in 2011, that touches directly or indirectly on orphan-dom. I don't really know what that means, but I am the granddaughter of an orphan, and my father was powerfully affected by that, so there's definitely something going on here).
This novel is also about coming from a place – metaphorical, physical – that is defined by poverty, trauma and addiction. A place where everyone is related to everyone (who’s yer fadder? or in this case, who's yer mudder?), but there is little intimacy and little meaningful communication or connection between people. There can't be, because there are such huge gaps in self-knowledge and so many secrets.
The poverty is not just because of a changing way of life that leads people "away" (and priests astray) and leaves those left behind with little to hope for. It is a poverty of spirit built from layers of emptiness that have been laid down over generations as each deals with its own secrets, and most die with them unexorcised.
And it's about all kinds of trauma, all kinds of addiction – personal bedevilment that extends far beyond the priesthood. And yes, it's about the sex scandals in the priesthood too. But these are put into a much broader and much more personal context.
It's also about what the priesthood is – why people enter it and how they struggle to define it for themselves. Beyond that, it's about how the scandals personally affect(ed) those of faith: the wrenching conflict between one's faith, one's trust in one man who represents that faith, and the truth.
What it's not is particularly atmospheric of Cape Breton; i.e., the external landscape of the place, although there are lots of descriptions of wind and rain/snow and cold and general bleakness, but these I feel are secondary and irrelevant. There’s a nod to the loss of Gaelic (and it’s important which character retains it, but I won’t spoil that here). I believe the loss of Gaelic is a metaphor for the loss of faith among these Cape Bretoners, whose island became a dumping ground for "bad" priests. The internal landscape of Cape Breton is well-told, although it's not a particularly flattering portrait.
Here's what I liked, loved even: this book didn't rest on pat explanations. It's too simple merely to say that the forced celibacy of the priesthood leads to aberrant sexual behaviour. Or, that damaged people are attracted to the priesthood, at which point they are damaged further. There is nothing particularly anti-Catholic here (at least, as a non-Catholic, I didn't think so; Catholics might disagree). On the contrary, it's a sensitive and searching portrayal of an issue, and the people involved in it, which respects not just the complexity of their faith but also their humanity.
MacIntyre does a great job of what is essentially a character portrait (more than one, in fact) of a flawed and complex human being who happens to be a priest. Father MacAskill starts as a brittle, weak, ineffective priest who knows little of himself or of dealing with the faithful, beyond performing a duty to the Mother Church that implicates him in the scandals. He degenerates from there. As he bottoms out and confronts his own demons, lo and behold – he becomes not only more human, but also a better priest. (And MacIntyre does a 1000 percent better job of that character arc than I just did, which is why he won the Giller, I'd say). :-p
Well. Anyway. MacIntyre’s thesis – if he can be said to have one – is that nothing is as simple as it seems, and that priests go awry, as all humans do, when they deny or repress – or never know – the truth about themselves.
This is also a portrayal of a crisis of faith not in terms of one man's attempt to understand his relationship to God, but to understand his relationship to himself, to his past and to his calling.
One other thing: most of the reviews I've read comment on the disjointed nature of the narrative structure, with its flashbacks and flash-forwards. You need to be patient with this, because while it's disorienting at first, it gets more cohesive as the plot unfolds (and in fact, I believe this is intentional. As Fr. MacAskill becomes whole, the threads of time are tied together, and the links between past, present and future start to make sense. It’s quite clever.)
Concurrent with that, the dialogue is also disorienting at first. Conversation seems to go nowhere, or seems to rely on some kind of implicit but unspoken understanding between characters to which the reader is not privy. People talk, but there are gaps in dialogue (lots unsaid, lots under the surface), and weird stops, starts and jumps to conclusions as jarring as the jumps back and forth in time. As Fr. MacAskill’s and others’ pasts are revealed, true understanding – connection, even intimacy – starts to emerge. And then, sensible dialogue begins. By the last 50 pages, as the timing and the dialogue become whole and rich, this novel starts to feel entirely worthy of the accolades and awards it won (which is to say that I think criticisms of inconsistency, a lack of sure-handedness or trickery with respect to managing the novel's narrative flow or dialogue miss the point).
In the last third of the book, one of its most interesting (at least to me) themes coalesces, as the dialogue – i.e., not what is said but what is not said – changes: secrets prevent communication which prevents intimacy. And that fundamental, very existential aloneness – beyond sexual to an all-encompassing kind of connection to oneself, one's past, one's roots and family, and one's vocation, not to mention to others – is at the root of dysfunction, dread and despair. (There are several interesting references to existentialism, and Fr. MacAskill himself reads Heidegger).
A powerful novel. Maybe not a complete 5, but let it stand for now.
September 29, 2019
This was a dark, disturbing read. While the “story” was no surprise and has been documented over and over, for some reason I was expecting this to be different...This is a story of a priest, Father Duncan, who is a close confidante of the bishop and as such he is called to mitigate situations where other priests have fallen. If another priest is found to have committed some inappropriate act or acts, and the Catholic Church, in its wisdom, moves them to diffuse the situation, (rather than turn them over to authorities, or oust them from the church) and calls in Father Duncan to mitigate the losses and manage the damage.
This role weighs heavily on the well respected Father and over the years the weight of the burden of such big secrets takes its toll on him. The story starts at the time of Father Duncan’s ordination, and continues until some 35 years or so later.
The author uses flashbacks in time to reveal and relive the found secrets which only adds to the Father’s burden making the weight heavier and the toll of secrecy more deliberate.
Father Duncan continues to struggle with the role he has been given, and being human, he on more than one occasion gives in to his struggles and stumbles. Being of the Catholic faith, acts of contrition always follow.
The story has a few twists and an unexpected ending.
The author brilliantly describes the Cape Breton landscape, culture, and people and without such artistry, the story may have well fallen flat. In the words of my friend SnarkyLadyJD the story was “boring and slow”. While I didn’t find it boring, it was often slow.....much akin to life on the island. My book club read this at my urging, and two people didn’t read it, two more didn’t finish, SnarkLadyJD snarked it, one other gave a poor rating, and two of us gave it four stars.
Just to be clear, it is not a point of “liking” the story, as there is little that is redeeming in the topic, but McIntyre does a very good job of demonstrating the struggle created for all who were in some way touched by this topic. It was certainly not “enjoyable” for the content, but the literary skill with which the author tells the story provides a compensatory resolve.
I will certainly read more by Linden McIntyre as his is a gifted author.
This role weighs heavily on the well respected Father and over the years the weight of the burden of such big secrets takes its toll on him. The story starts at the time of Father Duncan’s ordination, and continues until some 35 years or so later.
The author uses flashbacks in time to reveal and relive the found secrets which only adds to the Father’s burden making the weight heavier and the toll of secrecy more deliberate.
Father Duncan continues to struggle with the role he has been given, and being human, he on more than one occasion gives in to his struggles and stumbles. Being of the Catholic faith, acts of contrition always follow.
The story has a few twists and an unexpected ending.
The author brilliantly describes the Cape Breton landscape, culture, and people and without such artistry, the story may have well fallen flat. In the words of my friend SnarkyLadyJD the story was “boring and slow”. While I didn’t find it boring, it was often slow.....much akin to life on the island. My book club read this at my urging, and two people didn’t read it, two more didn’t finish, SnarkLadyJD snarked it, one other gave a poor rating, and two of us gave it four stars.
Just to be clear, it is not a point of “liking” the story, as there is little that is redeeming in the topic, but McIntyre does a very good job of demonstrating the struggle created for all who were in some way touched by this topic. It was certainly not “enjoyable” for the content, but the literary skill with which the author tells the story provides a compensatory resolve.
I will certainly read more by Linden McIntyre as his is a gifted author.
April 25, 2021
With Linden MacIntyre being one of my favourite journalists, I was thrilled to hear of his novel being honoured as the winner of the Scotiabank Giller prize for 2009. After reading the synopsis of the story, I knew it would be an uncomfortable read, but trusted in MacIntyre’s reverence and honesty to make it through. I was not disappointed.
The Bishop’s man is a story told in spirals, as we twist and turn through past and present fluidly, giving us a clearer picture of the events that can become cloudy through space and time. It is by way of these happenings that we are presented with brutally honest characters living lives of deceit and despair. These tragically flawed people are human in their beastliness, conflicted, damaged, and eternally struggling to break the vicious cycle of pain and suffering.
At times my anger was palpable as the Bishop insisted on covering up the harsh realities of the evil-doings administered by the hands of his precious and misunderstood brotherhood, where ‘victims’ were only the creations of over-active imaginations and troubled youth.
On more than one occasion I wrestled with my understanding of good and evil, and what faith means in today’s modern world. I am of the mind that Catholicism and its primitive structures are in need of a revamp in respect to how the world has changed, and what we’ve learned about humanity along the way. For the sake of the Catholics out there, I pray that they will make the changes that are needed to gain back so many members that they have lost due to their closed-mindedness and denial. As naïve as some may consider it, I will always believe that faith is an important and necessary part of a happy, moral and fulfilling life.
Amidst the madness and injustice, we pause to take in the haunting and beautiful descriptions of small towns, where you can hear the fiddle and smell the sea salt lifting off the page. Linden MacIntyre has proven to be an adoring poet in his love of the East coast and of the Gaelic and English languages. His words are profound and emotive, and I look forward to picking up his other novels in the hopes of more of the same.
Just a couple of his affecting offerings…
“The future has no substance until it turns the corner into history.”
“The bay is flat, endless pewter beneath the rising moon.”
The Bishop’s man is a story told in spirals, as we twist and turn through past and present fluidly, giving us a clearer picture of the events that can become cloudy through space and time. It is by way of these happenings that we are presented with brutally honest characters living lives of deceit and despair. These tragically flawed people are human in their beastliness, conflicted, damaged, and eternally struggling to break the vicious cycle of pain and suffering.
At times my anger was palpable as the Bishop insisted on covering up the harsh realities of the evil-doings administered by the hands of his precious and misunderstood brotherhood, where ‘victims’ were only the creations of over-active imaginations and troubled youth.
On more than one occasion I wrestled with my understanding of good and evil, and what faith means in today’s modern world. I am of the mind that Catholicism and its primitive structures are in need of a revamp in respect to how the world has changed, and what we’ve learned about humanity along the way. For the sake of the Catholics out there, I pray that they will make the changes that are needed to gain back so many members that they have lost due to their closed-mindedness and denial. As naïve as some may consider it, I will always believe that faith is an important and necessary part of a happy, moral and fulfilling life.
Amidst the madness and injustice, we pause to take in the haunting and beautiful descriptions of small towns, where you can hear the fiddle and smell the sea salt lifting off the page. Linden MacIntyre has proven to be an adoring poet in his love of the East coast and of the Gaelic and English languages. His words are profound and emotive, and I look forward to picking up his other novels in the hopes of more of the same.
Just a couple of his affecting offerings…
“The future has no substance until it turns the corner into history.”
“The bay is flat, endless pewter beneath the rising moon.”
January 7, 2013
"You know the eagles secret? He never lets us see him scavenging. You only see him soaring. Or sitting high up, somewhere out of reach. Kind of superior. He's very discreet about the mundane, the mortal... It's easier to mythologize that way." (346)
This book moved me in unexpected ways. As a member of a "helping" profession, I often find myself extremely isolated. I work with sexual offenders, addicts, victims- much as the central character of this story- and he truly gets the sense of isolation that comes with this type of work. What a person does to stay centred when hearing tales of hell-on-earth, holding the space with guilt, smugness, entitlement, excuses...then being with the families...and being with my own family. I found myself sympathizing at every turn. Sometimes I shed my own tears.
"How much will I disclose about isolation? The pain of personal impotence?...Living alone without privacy. The burden of trust without intimacy." (139)
I am facing a time in my own career when I struggle with the idea of a change, some of the reasons shared with our protagonist here, and some of my own ideas about a more simple life. This very much jaded my interaction with the story, and it is rare that I do so much self-disclosure in a book review. Suffice to say, MacIntyre has written a beautiful novel, taking a tragic situation and opening up the doors of the complex exploration, acknowledging that every crime has multiple victims, nothing is ever simple and everyone needs a break sometimes.
"A rest? I don't need a rest. I need an exit." (308)
This book moved me in unexpected ways. As a member of a "helping" profession, I often find myself extremely isolated. I work with sexual offenders, addicts, victims- much as the central character of this story- and he truly gets the sense of isolation that comes with this type of work. What a person does to stay centred when hearing tales of hell-on-earth, holding the space with guilt, smugness, entitlement, excuses...then being with the families...and being with my own family. I found myself sympathizing at every turn. Sometimes I shed my own tears.
"How much will I disclose about isolation? The pain of personal impotence?...Living alone without privacy. The burden of trust without intimacy." (139)
I am facing a time in my own career when I struggle with the idea of a change, some of the reasons shared with our protagonist here, and some of my own ideas about a more simple life. This very much jaded my interaction with the story, and it is rare that I do so much self-disclosure in a book review. Suffice to say, MacIntyre has written a beautiful novel, taking a tragic situation and opening up the doors of the complex exploration, acknowledging that every crime has multiple victims, nothing is ever simple and everyone needs a break sometimes.
"A rest? I don't need a rest. I need an exit." (308)
July 20, 2010
A topical story for our times told by an insider, Fr. Duncan MacAskill, who is a "hit man" for his church, responsible for removing sexual predators from among his colleagues to safer grounds, (so that they are free to commit more crimes, it seems from the news reports these days).
The story focuses on Duncan's unravelling and descent into alcoholism from combinations of the guilt piled on during his childhood, his suppressed feelings towards the women in his life, the isolation of his office, and the "sins of the fathers" that he has to clean up.
Three stories intersect: Duncan's father and his buddies' wartime "collateral damage" which result in later abuse and suicide, Duncan's sojourn in the Honduras during the "70's which also ends in tragedy, and his present story when he is sent as custodian of an isolated parish in Cape Breton (really intended to get him out of the way of a nosey press), not far from where he grew up and where his closet's skeletons are eagerly awaiting him. Bringing the three story lines into sharper focus and towards a painful resolution is the suicide of a young man in the parish community - by now, a recognized outcome of unresolved sexual abuse. Fr. Duncan is impelled to hunt down the perpetrator, despite having walked away from his previous job.
The author draws a sympathetic and haunting portrait of Duncan MacAskill, who seems to bear everyone's guilt, of victims and perpetrators alike. The sense of community in the parish is also evoked very well by people frequently bumping into each other or visiting the priest for a drink, and by illicit sexual couplings between parishioners from among the rather slim pickings available. Viciously guarded family secrets prove to be the only impediments to Duncan finding out "whodunit."
The author uses an economy of words, both in narrative and in dialogue to convey a lot. I particularly liked his short treatise on the Burdens of Priesthood (a.k.a. "what they don't teach you in seminary"): the struggle against idle speculation, the sterility of moral power in the age of secular celebrity, living alone without privacy, the burden of trust without intimacy, and struggling with fantasies about the ordinary - enough to make one take the cloth and shove it!
Despite this being a Giller winner, I couldn't help feel a bit lost in the rapid, and sometimes unwarranted, time shifts - some contrived for effect and pacing. I also felt that the tenses could have been better written and that it would have been okay once in a while to be a bit more direct about what was happening. There were words like "bum" "penis" and "anus" tossed out but the acts behind them were discussed in a roundabout fashion, as if there was fear of a lawsuit in an age when this subject is front and centre of the news.
The story focuses on Duncan's unravelling and descent into alcoholism from combinations of the guilt piled on during his childhood, his suppressed feelings towards the women in his life, the isolation of his office, and the "sins of the fathers" that he has to clean up.
Three stories intersect: Duncan's father and his buddies' wartime "collateral damage" which result in later abuse and suicide, Duncan's sojourn in the Honduras during the "70's which also ends in tragedy, and his present story when he is sent as custodian of an isolated parish in Cape Breton (really intended to get him out of the way of a nosey press), not far from where he grew up and where his closet's skeletons are eagerly awaiting him. Bringing the three story lines into sharper focus and towards a painful resolution is the suicide of a young man in the parish community - by now, a recognized outcome of unresolved sexual abuse. Fr. Duncan is impelled to hunt down the perpetrator, despite having walked away from his previous job.
The author draws a sympathetic and haunting portrait of Duncan MacAskill, who seems to bear everyone's guilt, of victims and perpetrators alike. The sense of community in the parish is also evoked very well by people frequently bumping into each other or visiting the priest for a drink, and by illicit sexual couplings between parishioners from among the rather slim pickings available. Viciously guarded family secrets prove to be the only impediments to Duncan finding out "whodunit."
The author uses an economy of words, both in narrative and in dialogue to convey a lot. I particularly liked his short treatise on the Burdens of Priesthood (a.k.a. "what they don't teach you in seminary"): the struggle against idle speculation, the sterility of moral power in the age of secular celebrity, living alone without privacy, the burden of trust without intimacy, and struggling with fantasies about the ordinary - enough to make one take the cloth and shove it!
Despite this being a Giller winner, I couldn't help feel a bit lost in the rapid, and sometimes unwarranted, time shifts - some contrived for effect and pacing. I also felt that the tenses could have been better written and that it would have been okay once in a while to be a bit more direct about what was happening. There were words like "bum" "penis" and "anus" tossed out but the acts behind them were discussed in a roundabout fashion, as if there was fear of a lawsuit in an age when this subject is front and centre of the news.
July 2, 2021
I thought this was a masterfully written book and would definitely read more of MacIntyre's novels. Apparently this is part of a loose trilogy. A slow burn for sure but after about the first 1/3, hard to put down even with a slowly moving plot. Lots of heavy themes to explore and big questions about humanity, morality, identity. Hard to put into words. The top reviews for this one do it justice much better than I can. Would recommend but be warned it's heavy and dark.
August 28, 2009
Journalist Linden MacIntyre uses fiction to tackle one of the biggest scandals of the 20th century Catholic Church, the sexually abusive priests and the havoc that they created. Through the eyes of Duncan MacAskill, a fifty something priest, we are taken on a tour of the emotional and political landscape of an institution and individuals failing to respond adequately to a major crisis. Set in Cape Breton in the 1990's MacIntyre has spun a tale that is believeable in its understanding of a complex pyschological issue. And the guy can write.
October 14, 2010
I avoided this book because of the repulsiveness of the subject matter and, were it not for book club, would probably have kept on avoiding it. That would have been a shame, as it’s turned out to be a good book. The main character struggles with guilt arising from many “sins” of omission and commission in his past, one of them being his role as the bishop’s go-to guy whenever it was time to move a troublesome priest to a place where he might not cause quite so much trouble. The book grapples with the results of child abuse and asks why, but doesn’t attempt to provide easy answers - though I was certainly left with the impression that if only people would be open and would not keep “secrets” many problems would be lessened or avoided. I got a bit annoyed with the style in places as Father MacAskill’s past was revealed in brief bits from his Central America journal and short snatches of childhood memory, but eventually all was revealed and all the threads were woven together. I liked the genuine feeling for place that came through loud and clear. On the whole, well worth reading.
June 8, 2010
This book would have gotten 4 stars if the storyline was changed to be linear, or possibly if I was able to read it in one sitting. The story jumped around so much, between 3 or 4 different time periods in the protagonist's life, that I was constantly wondering where I was in his story. It seems like these days you can't write an award winning novel without using non-linear storytelling. Everybody's doing it! I think it has its place, but not all stories need to be that convoluted. Some just need to be told, start to finish. I guess the writers and editors have no problem as they probably get through this book in 1 or 2 days, but if you are planning on reading this over a period of more than a week, don't.
November 5, 2010
"One day we'll talk", I said. "Yes", you said. "About purposes", I said. "Okay", you said. "Or about having no purposes", I said.
Listening to this audio book was, at times, grating because so much of the conversation goes on as above. Lots of "I/he/she said" after short sentences going nowhere....why?....because no one ever talks!
I missed the point of this one, I think. There are mysteries and secrets and guilt referred to throughout but very few explanations. Father MacAskill is so aloof that it's hard to like him. He is suffering, granted, but one really starts not to care.
Listening to this audio book was, at times, grating because so much of the conversation goes on as above. Lots of "I/he/she said" after short sentences going nowhere....why?....because no one ever talks!
I missed the point of this one, I think. There are mysteries and secrets and guilt referred to throughout but very few explanations. Father MacAskill is so aloof that it's hard to like him. He is suffering, granted, but one really starts not to care.
September 18, 2019
This is a well written book that tackles some big issues and the last couple of chapters are page turners for sure. I would have enjoyed this book better if there was less hopping around in time. I don’t usually have a problem with a plot unfolding in a nonlinear fashion, but MacIntyre kind of went overboard with it here so I’m downgrading to three stars instead of four.
August 20, 2011
The Bishop's Man",
"This is a wonderfully written book..very evocative of the settings in small towns and villages of Cape Breton. The atmosphere drew me right into the story of Father MacAskill, a priest struggling with his role as bishop's man, Exorcist or Purificator as he is dubbed by others.
He seems to think at first that his role is to comfort family's of victims abused by priests, but soon finds his role is to cover up the impending scandals and assist the bishop in sending the wayward priests elsewhere. In fact he is not even permitted to use the word ""victim"" in his reporting to the bishop.
Father MacAskill's loneliness is profound and he has had a troubled childhood and secrets involving a time he was sent away to be a pastor in Central America. This was after he thought he witnessed a respected priest abusing a child and reported it to the priest's friend, the bishop. As he goes about the bishop's business in addition to being village priest he begins to descend into alcoholism. There is a mystery involving a suicide, and villagers are also good at hiding secrets. I felt I was reading a story about real people. The sense of characters and place seemed very authentic.
I first gave the book 4.5 stars because either some of the points I had missed, or the explanations were left ambiguous. But the character of Father MacAskill has so resounded in my mind and feelings , as few people in books do, that I am upping the book to 5 stars.
"This is a wonderfully written book..very evocative of the settings in small towns and villages of Cape Breton. The atmosphere drew me right into the story of Father MacAskill, a priest struggling with his role as bishop's man, Exorcist or Purificator as he is dubbed by others.
He seems to think at first that his role is to comfort family's of victims abused by priests, but soon finds his role is to cover up the impending scandals and assist the bishop in sending the wayward priests elsewhere. In fact he is not even permitted to use the word ""victim"" in his reporting to the bishop.
Father MacAskill's loneliness is profound and he has had a troubled childhood and secrets involving a time he was sent away to be a pastor in Central America. This was after he thought he witnessed a respected priest abusing a child and reported it to the priest's friend, the bishop. As he goes about the bishop's business in addition to being village priest he begins to descend into alcoholism. There is a mystery involving a suicide, and villagers are also good at hiding secrets. I felt I was reading a story about real people. The sense of characters and place seemed very authentic.
I first gave the book 4.5 stars because either some of the points I had missed, or the explanations were left ambiguous. But the character of Father MacAskill has so resounded in my mind and feelings , as few people in books do, that I am upping the book to 5 stars.
September 13, 2022
I am in a quandary. I would like to give this 4 stars because of the quality of the writing. But the ending left me disappointed. I guess I like things spelled out in detail for me. I feel the same about some of the situations in the book where we seem to be left to draw our own conclusions. The descriptions of the investigations and relocation of guilty priests were as vivid as they were appalling. I am not Catholic but am familiar with the religion. These were terrible decisions made to avoid acknowledging responsibility but these “remedies” are not unique to the Catholic Church. Reassigning the perpetrators seemed to be the common way of dealing with sexual predators in any setting whether it be church, school or business! This novel provided a frightening insight to the decision making process. The author personalizes the effect of these manoeuvres on the man responsible for moving the priests, as well as the victims. The fact that the bishop refused to allow them to be referred to as victims speaks volumes. As someone described it, it is a bleak novel but we need to be cognizant that this behaviour exists. I like this author and will read more of his work.
December 14, 2009
This book was wonderfully different from what I was expecting. I was expecting a straight narrative about sexual abuse in one church or community. Instead I got this rich, layered narrative about the priest's role, isolation and the challenges of being both a priest and a man. I loved MacIntyre's style of writing, and the weave of the narrative. Nothing in here was black or white, and the story continued to raise questions throughout. This was an excellent example of "show, not tell." The reader was not told anything, but was shown over time.
This book deserved to win.
This book deserved to win.
February 20, 2011
This novel won the Canadian Giller prize and at the time it was considered a surprise. I didn't expect to like this novel, but I did, very much. I became totally engrossed in it. It's a quiet, psychological novel, written in a well-crafted spare style. The subject couldn't be more important or relevant. The main character, a sympathetic priest who only wants to do the right thing, is given the assignment of helping to cover up the sexual abuses that are increasingly coming to light. His suspicions, and discomfort, increases. This novel is very gripping, in a quiet way. I highly recommend it.
September 16, 2010
I agree with what many have said regarding the time frame of story jumping around so much, difficult to keep track of where you are in the story - after finishing the book I am still not 100% certain of what really happened - and who was guilty of what - not sure I would have picked this book as a Giller winner. There still seem to be some unanswered questions for me.
April 22, 2017
This book was well worth reading, and I'd put it off for a long time. In many ways I had dreaded reading this book because of the subject matter; I wasn't sure to what depth it would go and I really was worried that it might be overly gratuitous in describing sexual abuse by priests.
I liked this book more than I thought I would; it was well-written and a page-turner. It was an interesting exploration of the life of a priest and depicted the loneliness and temptations very well. I was disappointed by the ending, though, as I felt that there was no real resolution. Perhaps that is appropriate, because the central issues behind sexual abuse are not so easily resolved that they could be tidily wrapped up in a chapter or two? I plan to read more of MacIntyre's "Cape Breton" series to learn more.
I liked this book more than I thought I would; it was well-written and a page-turner. It was an interesting exploration of the life of a priest and depicted the loneliness and temptations very well. I was disappointed by the ending, though, as I felt that there was no real resolution. Perhaps that is appropriate, because the central issues behind sexual abuse are not so easily resolved that they could be tidily wrapped up in a chapter or two? I plan to read more of MacIntyre's "Cape Breton" series to learn more.
February 6, 2020
This book was a chore to read. Had it not been a book club selection, there’s no way I would have finished it. There were sections that were very well written ... some truly beautiful descriptions of the east coast ... but the way the story was pieced together made it impossible for me to enjoy. There was constant jumping around from timeline to timeline, with no clear indication of where we were in the story. The middle dragged on and became repetitive. The end was underwhelming. I couldn’t get into it and was relieved when I finally reached the last chapter. Definitely not for me.
April 18, 2024
The Bishop's Man has been on my TBR list for a long time.
The harsh yet beautiful landscapes of Cape Breton blend with the scandalous, devastating tale of abuse and devastating secrets that linger through generations and within the Catholic Church. So many dreadful secrets below the surface that continue to harm...
I couldn't help but picture the author as Father Duncan as he dealt with the tragedies in his Parrish as well as his own family history.
The harsh yet beautiful landscapes of Cape Breton blend with the scandalous, devastating tale of abuse and devastating secrets that linger through generations and within the Catholic Church. So many dreadful secrets below the surface that continue to harm...
I couldn't help but picture the author as Father Duncan as he dealt with the tragedies in his Parrish as well as his own family history.
November 15, 2010
It was just okay for me. I wasn't keen on MacIntyre's style. It felt self-consciously oblique to me. Didn't find myself caring much about the main character. But it was an interesting and unusual perspective on child molestation and the Catholic church, and it never got sordid, so points for that.
January 7, 2025
Linden MacIntyre is a great story teller. The Bishop’s Man is rich in character development where you are often able to see yourself in some of the characters that come to life on the page. Life choices, regret and silence are all important themes in this book. It reminds us how random life can be and the fact that we are masters of our own destiny. Though this mastery is often conflicted with shoulda’s, woulda’s and coulda’s. A must read.
November 8, 2020
Disappointing, often confusing. The story travelled between stories in a disjointed way and there was never an explicit explanation of just what the hell happened ...
November 11, 2024
Highly readable even whilst being difficult subject matter. Linden knows his CB!
October 4, 2021
This book could upset some, but I found it gut wrenchingly real. It is the story of a priest in a small parish, worn out from the conflict between what he believes is morally and ethically right, and what the Bishop is telling him he must do to protect the church. It mirrors so many things we have heard so often.
September 15, 2019
I wasn't sure I wanted to read this book. As a catholic I'm so sickened by the abuse suffered by so many. Yet I know that there are many good men who are our priests and they suffer and are angered by those who have commited these crimes. We are betrayed by the men who covered up their crimes and moved these men around time and again to endanger even more children. This book tells the story of so many who are touched in so many ways by what has gone on for too long.
November 20, 2011
"The Bishop's Man" is the final nominee for the 2010 Giller Prize in my reading. It is a novel that I can easily see winning the award (and it in fact did so,) given the way that it reflects the troubling headlines in our country and society these days, and given the depth, perception and sense of place with which the author writes. Duncan MacAskill tells his story of life as a hard-edged priest, the enforcer for a politically-skillful bishop who is trying to suppress scandal for the church at the expense of the faithful who have been sexually abused. For MacAskill, the church seems to have been a refuge from a conflictual and deprived childhood, and he is prepared to do what he is asked to serve it. But his own guilt about what he has been part of grows over the years, pushing him into alcoholism to escape it, and the suicide of an abused young man in his parish ultimately overcomes his institutional commitment as a priest, and spurs his rebirth as a full human being. His is a complex story, presented with a skillful handling of flashbacks and a rich cast of interesting characters -- yet providing a strong ongoing narrative focused on MacAskill's growing crisis of confidence with respect to his church.
For me, MacAskill was not a fully convincing character. Priests that I have dealt with have usually had a sense of mission that you could discern -- based around the sort of social commitment that Alfonso seemed to have as MacAskill saw him in Honduras, or the depth of faith that I have seen driving others. Perhaps MacAskill had that, and lost it in the heavy-handed tasks he was asked to handle, but certainly there is a dimension missing in a priest who seems to spend his time learning to drive a boat, drinking and interacting with an attractive woman. That this sense of vocation should have become so completely absent struck me as an outsider's view of the priesthood that would not be consistent with how MacAskill would view himself. His self-crisis would, for me, have seemed more of a reality if part of his struggle had been with those beliefs and associated activities that had kept him going for so many years.
In the end, then, I would not choose this book for the Giller. It is a more complex story than The Disappeared, and it does connect well with our contemporary Canadian world, but it is not as convincing and passionate a novel as The Disappeared. That novel is, for me, such an intense and lyrical testament to love and to tragedy that it surpasses the four other Giller nominees.
For me, MacAskill was not a fully convincing character. Priests that I have dealt with have usually had a sense of mission that you could discern -- based around the sort of social commitment that Alfonso seemed to have as MacAskill saw him in Honduras, or the depth of faith that I have seen driving others. Perhaps MacAskill had that, and lost it in the heavy-handed tasks he was asked to handle, but certainly there is a dimension missing in a priest who seems to spend his time learning to drive a boat, drinking and interacting with an attractive woman. That this sense of vocation should have become so completely absent struck me as an outsider's view of the priesthood that would not be consistent with how MacAskill would view himself. His self-crisis would, for me, have seemed more of a reality if part of his struggle had been with those beliefs and associated activities that had kept him going for so many years.
In the end, then, I would not choose this book for the Giller. It is a more complex story than The Disappeared, and it does connect well with our contemporary Canadian world, but it is not as convincing and passionate a novel as The Disappeared. That novel is, for me, such an intense and lyrical testament to love and to tragedy that it surpasses the four other Giller nominees.
August 29, 2011
I enjoyed - yes, genuinely enjoyed reading this book much, much more than I'd anticipated. I've always admired Linden MacIntyre as a journalist and assumed he would have an ideally balanced perspective, of both compassion and acuity, for such controversial subject matter as the sexual abuse scandals associated with the Catholic church. That admiration and confidence in the author's vision still didn't give me the stomach, though, for a story so closely ripped from the headlines, with the news of more allegations against another Catholic priest hitting right around the time "The Bishop's Man" was longlisted, then shortlisted for the coveted Giller Prize. Long past the time that the book won the prize, I've finally read it, and am glad I did.
The voice of Father Duncan MacAskill is dry at first, blandly and reticently stating the facts of his acknowledged work within the Catholic church, among parishes in the Maritimes, as something of a fixer for the bishop. His more benign moniker is "The Bishop's Man", but many of his fellow priests refer to him as the "Exorcist" for his behind-the-scenes work defusing situations and relocating men of the cloth who have strayed into various forms of scandal. He questions his role and his own faith as the job entails not only covering up unsavoury situations, but also increasingly includes running interference with communities, families, the police and media.
Father MacAskill's words and observations may be spare at first, but they are not unaffecting. As he joins a new parish close to his birthplace and slowly establishes new connections and re-establishes dormant family connections, his is not the voice of someone who doesn't care, but that of someone who has cared much too much and is shell shocked by what he has seen and experienced. As he gets thrust more and more reluctantly into situations that test his conscience, he learns harshly that things not what they seem, in what unfolds dramatically before him in the present, but also in pivotal chapters of his own past life.
In the end, the bishop's man realizes with some relief and humility that he is just a man, but also beholden to neither the bishop and what the bishop represents, nor to anyone else. That realization leaves much unknown for MacAskill at the end of the book, but leaves the reader glad to have seen him along his journey.
The voice of Father Duncan MacAskill is dry at first, blandly and reticently stating the facts of his acknowledged work within the Catholic church, among parishes in the Maritimes, as something of a fixer for the bishop. His more benign moniker is "The Bishop's Man", but many of his fellow priests refer to him as the "Exorcist" for his behind-the-scenes work defusing situations and relocating men of the cloth who have strayed into various forms of scandal. He questions his role and his own faith as the job entails not only covering up unsavoury situations, but also increasingly includes running interference with communities, families, the police and media.
Father MacAskill's words and observations may be spare at first, but they are not unaffecting. As he joins a new parish close to his birthplace and slowly establishes new connections and re-establishes dormant family connections, his is not the voice of someone who doesn't care, but that of someone who has cared much too much and is shell shocked by what he has seen and experienced. As he gets thrust more and more reluctantly into situations that test his conscience, he learns harshly that things not what they seem, in what unfolds dramatically before him in the present, but also in pivotal chapters of his own past life.
In the end, the bishop's man realizes with some relief and humility that he is just a man, but also beholden to neither the bishop and what the bishop represents, nor to anyone else. That realization leaves much unknown for MacAskill at the end of the book, but leaves the reader glad to have seen him along his journey.
Read
June 26, 2017Be thee fair warned, I'm going to talk about the ending first, so spoilers and all that:
It felt like a cop out. Turns out the priest (Brandon Bell) who the protagonist (Father MacAskill) has sent away to the little Cape Breton village (because of his "diddling" in Newfoundland) DIDN'T molest the Cape Breton boy who grew up and killed himself. So, our guilt-ridden protagonist is essentially exonerated of the darkness that is the key theme of the book. And we see this coming for some time. Then, MacAskill turns around and, we think (because here the narrator blacks out a little and leaves the whole thing rather inconveniently ambiguous), kills the man who IS actually guilty of molesting the boy who grew up and killed himself (this man having drunkenly confessed his actions immediately after MacAskill realized he was off the hook when the other priest told him so), acting as a sword of righteous vengeance if you believe in that kind of thing. Catholics aren't supposed to, which I suppose should leave our narrator with something to feel guilty about, except no one knows except those few who do and do not care that an old child molester was killed. It should be messy as hell but it's all too clean.
This after 400 pages of time-shifting through muddled memory and delaying conversations of substance, characters awkwardly saying nothing at all - heavy dialogue that isn't really dialogue, creating an at-times stilted writing style. "We should talk some time" is a favourite phrase of most of the characters. "Any time," our priest answers, never ever meaning it.
The novel was rightly lauded for its complex characters. MacIntyre is methodical in their development. He is a seasoned journalist, one of our nation's best, and he's seen it all. For the most part, despite my issues with the writing, it was believable and insightful into the Catholic church's mindset in the 90s (and still).
It felt like a cop out. Turns out the priest (Brandon Bell) who the protagonist (Father MacAskill) has sent away to the little Cape Breton village (because of his "diddling" in Newfoundland) DIDN'T molest the Cape Breton boy who grew up and killed himself. So, our guilt-ridden protagonist is essentially exonerated of the darkness that is the key theme of the book. And we see this coming for some time. Then, MacAskill turns around and, we think (because here the narrator blacks out a little and leaves the whole thing rather inconveniently ambiguous), kills the man who IS actually guilty of molesting the boy who grew up and killed himself (this man having drunkenly confessed his actions immediately after MacAskill realized he was off the hook when the other priest told him so), acting as a sword of righteous vengeance if you believe in that kind of thing. Catholics aren't supposed to, which I suppose should leave our narrator with something to feel guilty about, except no one knows except those few who do and do not care that an old child molester was killed. It should be messy as hell but it's all too clean.
This after 400 pages of time-shifting through muddled memory and delaying conversations of substance, characters awkwardly saying nothing at all - heavy dialogue that isn't really dialogue, creating an at-times stilted writing style. "We should talk some time" is a favourite phrase of most of the characters. "Any time," our priest answers, never ever meaning it.
The novel was rightly lauded for its complex characters. MacIntyre is methodical in their development. He is a seasoned journalist, one of our nation's best, and he's seen it all. For the most part, despite my issues with the writing, it was believable and insightful into the Catholic church's mindset in the 90s (and still).
January 29, 2011
The relaxed pace of MacIntyre's prose matches the setting of the novel - a boating community coast of Nova Scotia. He feels no need to rush the story, as he slowly introduces us to the characters and the situation that slowly suffocates the personal life of Father Duncan MacAskill. I enjoy this type of skillful writing, where the author slowly leads the reader deep into the narrative, giving him time to exist and understand this world.
The strengths of the prose might explain my disappointment with much of the novel. The story is not nearly as powerful as the style. MacIntyre seems to have a good grasp of human politics in family and religion, with the need to cover up scandal in order to put forward the best product possible. He does not convey and notion of what faith looks like. This is where the novel falls apart. The devout priests that we meet are only devout out of a sense of social justice, not out of any deep longing for connection with God. There isn't any compelling evidence as to why Father Duncan would feel "called" to the priesthood. There is no call heard throughout the novel.
Despite the lack of faith present in the novel, I would have been content enough had the story taken me to a satisfying conclusion. Instead, this leisurely paced novel has a rushed finale, tying up loose ends like this were an episode of a mediocre T.V. drama. The characters and reader deserved better than this.
Still, the overall pacing and "placing" of the novel yield this recommendation. If only . . .
The strengths of the prose might explain my disappointment with much of the novel. The story is not nearly as powerful as the style. MacIntyre seems to have a good grasp of human politics in family and religion, with the need to cover up scandal in order to put forward the best product possible. He does not convey and notion of what faith looks like. This is where the novel falls apart. The devout priests that we meet are only devout out of a sense of social justice, not out of any deep longing for connection with God. There isn't any compelling evidence as to why Father Duncan would feel "called" to the priesthood. There is no call heard throughout the novel.
Despite the lack of faith present in the novel, I would have been content enough had the story taken me to a satisfying conclusion. Instead, this leisurely paced novel has a rushed finale, tying up loose ends like this were an episode of a mediocre T.V. drama. The characters and reader deserved better than this.
Still, the overall pacing and "placing" of the novel yield this recommendation. If only . . .
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