My Father's House: AS SEEN ON BBC BETWEEN THE COVERS (Rome Escape Line Book 1)

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A masterwork… so urgent, so incredibly alive… A searing and beautiful example of storytelling’s infinite importance. The story in ‘My father’s house’ is always building to Christmas Eve, 1943, when a mission (code name Rendimento) takes place. Although parts could have gone on longer, IMHO, other parts seemed to need a bit of editing or shortening.

I particularly like the way the author chooses to tell his tale via the countdown in 1943, which is interspersed with BBC Interviews of the choir members recorded in 1962 to 63 and some transcripts. Joseph O’Connor has created an unforgettable novel of love, faith and sacrifice, and what it means to be truly human in the most extreme circumstances.

It’s the story of tremendous bravery and sacrifice, and is based on the true story of Hugh O’Flaherty. On Christmas Eve, 1943, a mission (code name Rendimento) was run by members of a choir and a network of accomplices. The novel provides wonderful background on each character and follows each of them through the action.

What a read – what a story, this piece of historical fiction is based on real events using fictional characters created by amalgamating real players of this period of WWII Rome. This annoys not only the nazis but also incurs the wrath of the Vatican, worried about their neutral status. A man facing the not inconsiderable pressures of a Himmler expecting him to destroy the Escape Line through which so many are spirited out of the city and the country. My only previous experience of Joseph O’Connor’s work is his novel Shadowplay, a fictionalized account of the life of Bram Stoker which was shortlisted for the Walter Scott Prize for Fiction 2020.The glimpses of his human side are shocking, alongside his brutal behaviour and casual violence, while you feel his obsession with O’Flaherty and the mind games he uses against him, highlight O’Flaherty’s essential strength. The atmosphere in Rome is incredibly tense and the stunning and beautiful city provides such a contrast to the horrors of Nazi occupation.

Finally – and triumphantly – My Father’s House is an intimate drama that illuminates both the fragility and the wonder of unlikely human connections forged in adversity and, in some cases, enduring for a lifetime. Monsignor O'Flaherty is a true hero as are those who helped him with the plans despite the danger to themselves. It has come to their notice that Christmas Eve may represent a huge opportunity to move the so many hidden within the many rooms of the Vatican City. The countdown to the Rendimento adds further suspense and tension, and I like the way the author almost draws this out (in a good way) as you’re almost holding your breath and when it comes you are willing them on, but so afraid for them. I can say with absolute certainty that this is one of the best works of historical fiction I have ever read.Their cover is a choir and the choristers are Delia Kieran, wife to the senior Irish diplomat at the Vatican, Marianna de Vries, a Dutch, freelance journalist, Sir D’Arcy Osborne, the British ambassador, Enzo Angelucci, former new stand owner, Sam Derry, an escaped British prisoner of war, John May is the resourceful man servant to the ambassador, Contessa Giovanna Landini, a widow, and the “conductor” is Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty. Against a sweeping plot fueled by loss, pleasure, greed, yearning, violence, and revenge, will these characters' connections become a path to escape, or a trigger of further destruction?

Four thousand frightened prisoners crammed like abused beasts, half starved, into a couple of barbed-wired stony fields. It's thought that through O'Flaherty, with the help of his choir and surrounding network, over 6,000 people were saved. He was deeply affected by the plight of the prisoners, the filthy conditions of the camps and the inhuman treatment meted out to the prisoners by their Nazi captors. This book is based on the true story of Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty who risked his life to save smuggle thousands of Jews and escaped Allied prisoners out of Italy.The background of this tribute to a priest, Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty, living in Vatican City at the start of the war when thousands of Nazi troops and their evil commander, Obersturmbannführer Paul Hauptmann, (Kappler) ruled with an iron hand. He heavily suspects O'Flaherty of being the mastermind, but his efforts to trap him keep falling flat. It's another part of the book where O'Connor excels, such is his attention to detail of the buildings in the basilica. But when two former colleagues turn up at his door with questions about a decades-old case, one which Tom never quite came to terms with, he finds himself pulled into the darkest currents of his past.