(The Catholic Herald) – It’s been an extraordinary publishing sensation – a novel, now in its fourth edition, selling in its thousands, with no advertising or large-scale promotion, and no major distributor. News of Brian Gail’s Fatherless has been spread by word of mouth, copies being ordered and passed on from friend to friend, or through families.
No one could say it’s great literature, or even particularly well written. But it really is a rather gripping read, not least because it has some of the staple ingredients of a good Catholic novel: confessional scenes, great moral tension, a haunting description of an early morning Mass. There is also a moving description of an encounter with Pope John Paul II.
But what gives the book its cutting edge is its essential plot – which revolves around sinister aspects of what the contraceptive pill can do, and the results that it produces in human relationships. (more…)