I expected a tense thriller set in Rome in 1943 but I got something much better. You may know the story; I didn’t.
But I have read Philippe Sand’s books: East West Street and Ratline. (A continuation will be published this year.) He has investigated how senior Nazis were smuggled to South America after the war. The Vatican was often complicit in this humanitarian activity. My Father’s House describes the exfiltration of captured British soldiers and airmen organised by a group led by an Irish Catholic priest living in the Vatican.
Joseph O’Connor’s writing is a joy, rich in allusion. There are whiffs of Joyce in his vocabulary, references to a wide range of poets and philosophers, much music, some Shakespeare, even a mention for Jeeves and Wooster. He achieves this without seeming too contrived by delivering much of the story as interviews with participants twenty years later. Some delicious turns of phrase are introduced and, for such a grim subject, it is often very funny. Another strand of this true story is the duel between Father Hugh O’Flaherty and the Gestapo commandant in Rome, Paul Hauptmann.
Now here’s the rub. There are about a dozen factual accounts of this gripping story, so should I have read one of them? Perhaps, but I am glad I stumbled on O’Connor’s narrative – embroidered to make a page turner. And, oh joy, the continuation has just been published: The Ghosts of Rome.
The story of Mon. Hugh O’Flaherty was also the subject of the 1983 movie: The Scarlet and The Black.
O’Flaherty is buried in Cahersiveen in Co. Kerry. It’s a Jewish tradition to leave stones on a grave as a symbol of love and honour. To this day, Jewish people visit his grave and leave stones as a mark of appreciation for his efforts in saving Jews in Rome during the war.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Scarlet_and_the_Black
It’s a good read and clearly based on fact. But I found the attempt to reproduce the speech of the aristocrat Sir D’Arcy Osborne and of the Cockney John May rather unconvincing.