I was vaguely aware of this Canadian novelist’s name but had never read any of his books until recently. His name, via his grandaghter figures prominently in Terry Fallis’s A New Season, so I borrowed this one, said to be his best.
Short on plot and location, the main character is a very devout, idealistic, young Catholic priest, Father Dowling. He has deep philosophical discussions with an agnostic communist adopting some criticism of bourgeois society for his sermons. He tries to help two prostitutes, Ronnie and Midge, to find them other employment while they and their pimp, Lou, mock him behind his back. His visits to them inevitably leads to scandal and after they are arrested and expelled from the unspecified city (?Toronto) he is disciplined by the bishop, becomes even more fanatical, and ends up in a mental institution. The whereabouts of the girls is never revealed.
The stilted conversations, with no one saying what they mean, and Father Dowling’s endless self analysis, make it difficult to fully appreciate this book, even with one interpretation of it offered by Milton Wilson in the Afterword.
3.5/5
Thanks, Terry.
The Passionate Reader 