Office of Innocence

by Thomas Keneally

Marshalling the vast powers of narrative and historical re-creation that he brought to his international bestseller Schindler’s List , Thomas Keneally has created a moving and provocative novel about a headstrong young Catholic priest in World War II Australia. As Sydney braces itself for a Japanese invasion, Father Frank Darragh finds his pastoral duties becoming increasingly challenging. How should he counsel an AWOL black American soldier who may face death for his involvement with a white woman? And what should he say to another woman—the distressingly beguiling Kate Heggarty—who impresses him with her virtue even as she edges toward sin?

When Kate is found murdered, Darragh falls under suspicion. And even if the police clear him, his superiors—and his own conscience—may not. Office of Innocence is a book that’s impossible to put down, dense with moral complexity and alive with period detail.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Australia, War, Religion, Historical

336 pages, Paperback

First published March 18, 2003

About the author

Thomas Michael Keneally, AO (born 7 October 1935) is an Australian novelist, playwright and author of non-fiction. He is best known for writing Schindler's Ark, the Booker Prize-winning novel of 1982, which was inspired by the efforts of Poldek Pfefferberg, a Holocaust survivor. The book would later be adapted to Steven Spielberg's Schindler's List (1993), which won the Academy Award for Best Picture.

Often published under the name Tom Keneally in Australia.

Life and Career:

Born in Sydney, Keneally was educated at St Patrick's College, Strathfield, where a writing prize was named after him. He entered St Patrick's Seminary, Manly to train as a Catholic priest but left before his ordination. He worked as a Sydney schoolteacher before his success as a novelist, and he was a lecturer at the University of New England (1968–70). He has also written screenplays, memoirs and non-fiction books.

Keneally was known as "Mick" until 1964 but began using the name Thomas when he started publishing, after advice from his publisher to use what was really his first name. He is most famous for his Schindler's Ark (1982) (later republished as Schindler's List), which won the Booker Prize and is the basis of the film Schindler's List (1993). Many of his novels are reworkings of historical material, although modern in their psychology and style.

Keneally has also acted in a handful of films. He had a small role in The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (based on his novel) and played Father Marshall in the Fred Schepisi movie, The Devil's Playground (1976) (not to be confused with a similarly-titled documentary by Lucy Walker about the Amish rite of passage called rumspringa).

In 1983, he was made an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO). He is an Australian Living Treasure.

He is a strong advocate of the Australian republic, meaning the severing of all ties with the British monarchy, and published a book on the subject in Our Republic (1993). Several of his Republican essays appear on the web site of the Australian Republican Movement.

Keneally is a keen supporter of rugby league football, in particular the Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles club of the NRL. He made an appearance in the rugby league drama film The Final Winter (2007).

In March 2009, the Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd, gave an autographed copy of Keneally's Lincoln biography to President Barack Obama as a state gift.

Most recently Thomas Keneally featured as a writer in the critically acclaimed Australian drama, Our Sunburnt Country.

Thomas Keneally's nephew Ben is married to the former NSW Premier, Kristina Keneally.

Reviews

[Hugh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thomas Keneally is best known for the Booker winner Schindler's Ark and its adaptation as Schindler's List, but that book, though moving and impressive, does not show the full range of his writing. Having read four of his other books including two that I loved (Gossip from the Forest and The Widow And Her Hero) I couldn't resist borrowing this one when I found it on my parents' shelves. This is another fine book, and he is a versatile writer whose books are always interesting to read.

This one is something of a slow burner - the first part of the book introduces Frank Darragh, an idealistic and somewhat naive young Catholic priest working in the Sydney suburbs during the Second World War. Frank's willingness to listen sympathetically makes him a popular confessor, and his working life is described with a certain amount of dry humour and perhaps more detail than non-Catholics need.

The plot gets going when he gets involved with three very different people, who initially appear to have little in common. Mrs Flood is a dying woman who has been living openly in a menage a trois with her husband and Ross Trumble, a hot-headed left wing agitator who enjoys baiting the clergy. Kate Heggarty is the wife of a prisoner of war who has been captured by the Germans in North Africa who allows a mysterious male visitor to help her support her son, and Gene Fratelli is an American officer who approaches Darragh to ask him to say a mass for his dead aunt, and involves him in the case of a young black soldier who has deserted the army to live with a local woman.

Darragh's involvement in these cases gets him into trouble with the rigid hierarchy of the church, and when Kate is found strangled and Darragh's involvement reaches a mischievous local press he is sent on a retreat to reflect on his conduct.

The final part is gripping, as Keneally really gets to grips with the moral dilemmas Darragh faces in keeping the secrets of the confessional, where Fratelli has confessed to being Kate's visitor and murderer, knowledge that comes to endanger Darragh himself and explaining his well-meaning meddling to his superiors.

The story is set against the ominous backdrop of an Australia increasingly threatened by the Japanese following the falls of Singapore and Sumatra, and the recreation of historical detail and Keneally's feeling for the largely Irish Catholic working population of the suburbs he describes are rather impressive.

[Girish · Rating 4 out of 5]

Office of Innocence is one of those rare books that explores the dilemmas on the boundaries between moral systems and real life. It does so fittingly though an impressionable man of faith - a priest at that.

There is a wry humor in the conflicts between faith and action;duty and conscience. When you put yourself in the shoes of the protagonist, every incident poses the same questions to you!

You realize it is applicable to every one who has ever felt such conflict in our everyday mundane battle called life. Like "growing up" from innocence.

Requires a bit of patience but rewarding!

[Kas · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is set in 1942 Sydney, from the perspective of a young, and "idealistic (?)" priest. Father Darragh is a man whose religious ideology makes him likeable. He struggles to make sense of what's going on without losing his faith. In a sense, it seemed he wanted to remove the barrier between Christian faith and traditional morality. Remove hypocrisy from our lives. I found myself cheering him on.

[Cynthia Byrne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thomas Keneally writes knowledgeably about the priesthood, which was a vocation he once pursued. It’s hard to believe that he still practices Catholicism because of the way he writes about it, but he has created a story of a new priest who is too innocent and unworldly for the vocation. Father Frank Darragh has very little prior knowledge of how sinful people can be until he listens to their confessions. He’s distracted not only by those sinners, but by his own attraction to a lovely young woman whose husband is in a POW camp during the height of WW2, and then she is murdered. With very little evidence, he seems to be a suspect, but then finds out in the confessional who the real murderer is. Of course he cannot disclose those sins under the rules of his office. Very odd circumstances, some unwisely arranged by Frank and some as a result of an attack by the Japanese on a Sydney port (!!!), make for a rather shocking turn of plot.

[Susan Emmet · Rating 4 out of 5]

Perhaps my rating of this historical novel is colored by my relative ignorance of Catholic faith, priestly training and practice, and liturgy. Also, I didn't know any of the WW2 history regarding Australia. So I found the novel full of new and well-researched detailing about setting, Catholicism, Japanese incursion in the South Pacific, social/moral/religious/economic realities and the "problems" of love of many types and sorts.
This is a graphic novel and it rings true.
Father Frank Darragh's struggles to become a priest (and the reasons for that) and his honest recognition of being drawn to demonic or forbidden people and actions were clearly pictured, as was his love of the priestly life and its duties.
From his perch on Shit Hill in New Guinea during WW2 after he leaves the priesthood, this reader was left with feeling inside his head and all he honestly owned up to, did, gained and lost.
Most moving novel this is.
I had no idea Thomas Keneally had written so much!

[John Cheeseman · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is quite hard to define as a book as its part historical fiction, part crime thriller and part philosophical music on the human condition.
I liked it and never really knew what was coming next although the killer was pretty obvious quite early on.
I'm not religious and not raised a Catholic so it was quite interesting to learn about a young priest and how they are initiated and their early careers. I also didnt realise the fear the people of Australia had during the early stages of WW2 that they would be invaded by the Japanese.
If you are a Catholic and particularly religious then I doubt you're going to like this book due to the pretty appalling way the church treat Frank from start to finish for someone who was pure of heart and probably the only good person in the book.

[Joyce · Rating 2 out of 5]

I can't believe I persisted in reading this book. I've enjoyed other books by this Australian author and that's why I picked it out of a freebee bin. Heavy, heavy, on Catholicism - a young priest takes it upon himself to redeem all the romantic affairs in his area. The Japanese are bombing Darwin and everyone is in high state of nervous activity. He falls in love with a young married woman and has his own demons to pacify. He takes his job entirely too seriously. Personally, I cannot grasp the idea of 'sin'. it all seems quite normal to me.

[Samantha · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book Club Choice: This was my choice for the book club- I thought I'd go for Thomas Keneally as I have read quite a few and had enjoyed them all. He always chooses a particular non-fiction topic/era/person and develops a story around it. I really liked the central character of Father Darragh who really is a basically nice but naïve man and his development as a priest and human being. Kept the attention, always plenty happening and likeable characters. I think a good choice it will be interesting to hear the members' views.

[Ted Farrell · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the story of a young deeply committed Catholic priest in Sydney during the Second World War. His deep concern for the morality of those with whom he comes in contact leads him to reckless and irresponsible behaviour, much to the consternation of his parish priest. It is an interesting, thought-provoking book set against the background of tension, anxiety and occasional violence of the war.

[Colin Macintyre · Rating 4 out of 5]

Swithered over whether to give this a three star instead of four.

I found this to be a satisfying read. Pleasing to see the villain get punished, and i found it a bold choice to kill such a likable character early on.

Reading about Daragh's inner torment perhaps might have bored some readers but i believe it was interesting enough.

I enjoyed reading about Australia during WWII as this is something I've never really delved into.

[Ian Durant · Rating 3 out of 5]

Whilst I am a great fan of Thomas Keneally and his writing is up to his high standard here, somehow I just felt the catholic details eventually suffocated my reading. Sadly, I gave up on it, something which I don't usually do but as the year's go by and lots of great reading remains unexplored by me, I am more likely to drop out of a book.

[PG Collins · Rating 3 out of 5]

Might have better been entitled: "Office of Naiveté." Yet, it was, I suppose, reflective of the times. It was insufferable how Darragh was plagued by qualms of conscience ultimately in quest of his salvation. I wonder how the character paralleled the author's experience as a seminarian.

[Rosanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good Catholic novel of moral ambiguity and an interesting historical setting.

[Emily D · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great read. Much social value, accompanied by vivid historical details. No one is better than Keneally to take you to a place and time that is so real and rings so true. Highly recommend.

[Karin Christo · Rating 5 out of 5]

excellent nearly gave up, beginning slow for a couple chapters. Loved the Humor in it

[Evelyn Pecht · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a cradle Catholic, I enjoyed the many references to rituals I'd long forgotten. The moral dilemmas of the young, idealistic priest in WWII Australia kept me entertained. A good book.

[Dave Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

http://electrichalibut.blogspot.com/2...

[Robert Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Father Frank Darragh is a young priest and gets all the jobs no one else wants to do. He is happy with that situation because he feels he is learning to be a better priest. He is full of empathy for his less fortunate parishioners. When making personal calls throughout the parish he encounters an AWOL American soldier and an attractive married woman with a young son whose husband is a POW. these two situations lead him to question his calling. A very interesting read.

[S.H. Villa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Keneally is a master of his craft. The book is compelling, the young protagonist priest very convincingly portrayed. He becomes involved in three particular lives, one is a young woman, wife of a soldier (it is set in WWII Australia) who is either a prisoner of the Germans or dead; the second is a young black American soldier who goes AWOL to live with a white Australian woman; and the third is a very insistent and increasingly less plausible American sergeant who clearly wants something from him, as yet undefined. This embroils Father Frank Darragh in trying to save bodies as well as souls.

Having been raised a Catholic, I thought he caught very well the attitude of the Church in the person of the monsignor and in the person of the military chaplain. An adherence to norms and rules, a respect for social mores which far exceeds any Christian compassion, kindness or humanity. They were people doing a job, running a business in the monsignor’s case. But not so Father Darragh, still in the grip of his ideals. In trying to save the woman from sin – she tells him, away from the confessional, that she has a man friend who is, for the time being only a friend. But there is danger, Darragh is certain. He is also inappropriately dragged into the arrest of a black American AWOL soldier. We find out why later, but meanwhile he becomes more and more concerned that the man, due to his colour, will die in suspicious circumstances while in prison, as is the norm for such men. He contacts the military chaplain, who lends only minor and reluctant assistance, obviously having no intention of trying to circumvent the inevitable.

To me, the book had two themes, kindness and guilt. Our young priest becomes implicated when the woman he was trying to save is murdered, perhaps even implicated as the murderer. More attention is given to Darragh’s possible guilt than to the woman and the fate of her young son. Darragh himself becomes none too certain what his motives were towards the woman, but murder wasn’t one of them. He tries to help the boy but is rebuffed by the monsignor and instead made to take the boy to what seems a cold and uncaring, starkly religious orphanage. He begins to look into the death of the boy’s mother.

It seems everyone he tries to help comes to grief. He is ordered to take a sabbatical from the priesthood and serves in the army as an orderly where he encounters a wounded young man who had once been a monk and whose confession he had heard, making it a condition of absolution that he tell his superior in the monastery that he had sexually molested a boy. Instead the monk left and joined the army. Now he was dying. Was absolution possible?

But the question ought to be, Is guilt possible? Is it real? And the corollary, does it need a priest to absolve it, if so?

Of course guilt is a construction of social control. And, up to a point, Keneally seems to agree with this by showing us how cruelty even among Churchmen is not only possible but condoned as necessary. There is nothing real about guilt unless we define it as real. And even then, it is only 'real' to those who share the definition. When subjective meanings concur, they become illusions, and such illusions can be institutionalised as religions which offer their followers the warm comfort of shared meanings. And shared judgments. It’s nice to be right, but even nicer to right along with others. Makes your lips smack! But we cannot find guilt in others without finding it in ourselves. Having found it, we are indeed certain to suffer.

In the Office of Innocence, given that Father Frank could see through so much of Church doctrine; and given that he understood his view of guilt did not always coincide with that of the Church he served, he was close to a life-changing breakthrough. He had inner discipline, admirable perseverance, and he had courage. The choice was there: the illusion of guilt or would compassion lead him to true Innocence?

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Oh how I wish for half stars. If I could I would give this two and half stars. It was just barely okay but were it not for book group I would never have finished it. I nearly abandoned it several times, the first 50 pages or so were especially ... less than ok?

This is story of Frank Darragh, a young, naive, priest as in lacking life experience (which pretty well goes hand in glove with being young) struggling with innocence and guilt, his own, that of his congregation. Frank really feels called to the work and he really wants to help and save his people. In addition to the calling he felt to the priesthood, entering seminary straight out of high school, an older priest has given him the additional vocation to be a "merciful confessor."

At some point in the novel, through is innocence, Frank finds himself sucked into a whodunit when the lovely young mother he was counseling with is found murdered.

Set in Australia, during WWII there were many things I found interesting and worthy of thought. There is some beautiful prose and I liked the general story arc - Frank's instruction to be a merciful confessor, his efforts to do so while the seriousness of the sins he hears confessed grows directly proportionate to the threat of Japanese invasion. How his vanity and innocence and even the Church actually prevent him from achieving this worthy endeavor. In the end, through the confessional (naturally) he looses his innocence and is finally led to be a truly merciful confessor as he understands that neither he nor the Church can do this but instead trusts in "spaciousness of Christ" to forgive.

Part of me wants to reread this but only a very tiny corner of me, but lovely writing and big questions aside, I just didn't like it that much.

[David Lentz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Frank Darragh's tale is an ancient one dealing with the perils of innocence in a society where paradise is not only lost but long gone. He is a priest living in rural Australia trying his best to be ethical and human at a time when it appeared that the Japanese were about to invade Australia during World War II. It's painful in places to see where Darragh takes his good faith and how the world and his church make him pay for it. Keneally weaves the tale artfully and takes the big questions head-on. His language is spare but he is able to paint living vistas and round characters in only a few well-drawn brush strokes. His writing is compelling as much for its art as for his considerable skills as a gifted story-teller. I was dazzled by this novel and am confident that Keneally is destined for great acclaim as a novelist who possesses a commanding presence on the contemporary literary landscape.

[Kim · Rating 3 out of 5]

I generally like Thomas Keneally's books, particularly those set in Australia as this one is. It tells the story of Father Frank Darragh, a recently-appointed and unconventional priest in a suburb of Sydney during World War II. Whilst the storyline overall was quite good, there was just too much detail of the Roman Catholic services, dress, procedures etc. for my liking which, to my mind, were not essential for the story itself. Frank is tested by his attraction to one of his female parishioners, whose husband is being held prisoner by the Nazis but who seeks advice from him as she is receiving visits from another man. Infatuated with her but also trying to steer her towards what the church would see as 'correct' behaviour, Frank gets too involved, with repercussions for his career and the Church - 6/10.

[Cynthia Byrne · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author’s background gives him special knowledge of the priesthood and Catholicism in general and in detail. Father Frank Darragh has a certain innocence and naivety that makes him have a separate conscience not necessarily in agreement with his priestly office or his superiors. He briefly associates with a woman who is a wife and mother, and whose husband is taken prisoner by the Germans in a WW2 camp. When she is found murdered, he cannot get over it, and gets himself in one kind of trouble or another because of that and also because of his connection to a black American soldier. His life is in danger more than once, yet his strong sense of right and wrong keeps him on a dangerous path. Very suspenseful and also a sad story of a man who can’t help but do the right thing according to his lights.

[Jean · Rating 4 out of 5]

The "office of innocence" is the sacrament of reconciliation / confession. However, the title can also allude to the job of being an innocent, which the protagonist, a 27 year old priest in rural Australia is.

Father Frank Darraugh is an admirable human being and priest, in my eyes, although I'm positive some readers would think he's a fool. His "innocence" is an inability to imagine the consequences of the situations he willingly inserts himself in.

There was a little more history than I am interested in, especially at the very end of this novel.

[Deborah W · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had high expectations given that this is the same author who wrote "Schindler's List," and this book certainly delivered. Superbly written, but you really had to pay attention, and even then, I was a bit confused as to where the story was going, and why the protaganist did the things he did, and surprise, the books ends with a question instead of answers. It was only on reflection after finishing the book that I think I understand it. It's a story I'll continue to think back on, that's for sure.

[Harvey · Rating 5 out of 5]

- Keneally has been short-listed for the Booker Prize four times, and won it for Schindler's Ark in 1982 (movie title was 'Schindler's List'). I really enjoyed this engaging WWII-period novel about the challenges facing a new priest in Sydney, Australia. Although the plot was slow to build, the characters were very well developed and the gradual-but-inevitable loss of the young priest's innocence was palpably real.

[Dsolove · Rating 3 out of 5]

I also wish I could have rated it 21/2 stars. Well written, but the first 2/3 of the book were just so slow. I' m glad I read it, but have not recommended it to others. Poor father Frank seemed so naive, but in the end he cleverly found the murderer. The cost to do so was very high however. The moral dilemmas and the setting were unique. The characters And their actions were complex and kept me thinking about the book and them after I finished it.

[Ryan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jaunty tale of wartime Oz and American soldiers, largely seen through the eyes of a naive priest. I seem to read a lot of books about Catholics, in varying stages of belief. This was one of the few ones in which the characters do the obvious thing: namely, tell the Priest to sod off. Unlike other stories of this kind, the author plainly has an insider's knowledge of the priesthood and its workaday reality.

[Marvin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like Keneally's earlier book, Schindler's List, this is another account of a heroic but flawed character (an Australian priest during WWII) who faces a series of difficult moral choices, with strong support from his faith but lack of support from the church. It reminded me strongly of Graham Greene's best novels.

[Jo Birkett · Rating 3 out of 5]

Writing as good as you would expect but strictly for those interested in priestly navel gazing. There is a serial killer & things get exciting right at the end but the main theme - should Frank be a priest- is pretty clearly answerable from page 2. Remind me to put it straight down if I ever pick up another novel of religious agonising.