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Overview
Patrick Price-Johnson is on remand for the murder and intimate assault of a woman priest. His story begins with a mundane article for a local newspaper, but when his girlfriend Julia gets involved the stakes are raised. Patrick finds himself manipulated into a piece of literary detective work about the theological doctrine of midrash which will uncover a Church of England sex scandal. Or so he thinks. It is a journey that will drag him through fear, hypocrisy and despair to the darker side of love and faith and to a sad question: is unrequited love the only love that lasts?
Synopsis
Patrick Price-Johnson is on remand for the murder and intimate assault of a woman priest. His story begins with a mundane article for a local newspaper, but when his girlfriend Julia gets involved the stakes are raised. Patrick finds himself manipulated into a piece of literary detective work about the theological doctrine of midrash which will uncover a Church of England sex scandal. Or so he thinks. It is a journey that will drag him through fear, hypocrisy and despair to the darker side of love and faith and to a sad question: is unrequited love the only love that lasts?
Publishers Weekly
British author Furber follows her children's novel, What You See Is What You Get, with a dark novel for adults that raises disturbing questions about faith and religion. Freelance journalist Patrick Price-Johnson reveals from prison, where he's remanded on a murder charge, how he became obsessed with the Rev. Helen Halberd. In a flashback, Patrick interviews the attractive 46-year-old Anglican priest, who has written a controversial bestseller, Fire Down Below, for which she's been denounced as “a blasphemous handmaiden of the Anti-Christ” for trashing the Virgin Mary. Meanwhile, Patrick's girlfriend, Dr. Julia Nayler, wants Patrick to get the dirt on Helen, who may have had an affair with another unconventional Christian, the Rev. Neil Sarbridge, the dean of Lancaster College, Cambridge, in hopes of ridding Cambridge of the overbearing Sarbridge. Furber's needle-sharp characterization of the deranged Patrick is nothing short of terrifying. (Jan.)