A gift from Paul
Paul Gitsham’s fifth book, Forgive Me Father was the first book that Paul kindly gave me in preparation for the Crime Cymru interview and I now only have books seven and eight to go then I will be up to date with all his books before the interview is due to be recorded.
The fifth book has several themes which tie the fourth and fifth together. As I read the fourth I thought that there was a smaller lack of character development compared to all the other books but I was unaware that there would be an over arcing theme that would connect the two, that of religion. The fourth was around the Muslim religion and the fifth was based on the Catholic one. Given Warren’s and his wife’s use of IVF and the objections of his mother-in-law, this seemed a good minor link which was only touched on in the proceeding book.
As the book opens with a fire at the back end of a Priest care home and two teenagers are canoodling in the graveyard, this was an interesting way to begin and with the screams of the victim attracting their attention they knew there was something more sinister going on. But, why had the fire been set?
As the plot reveals itself the nature of the number of real life crimes that revolve around catholic priests, I’m sure you can imagine where the plot is going, so I won’t say it here.
As the book develops you get to see how important the size of the police station is and the interesting side job of the officer in the case. This is something I have heard about in other books but not with this level of detail, and is actually possibly a job that I could do if it was a little bit less complicated.
I enjoy reading about police procedurals but it’s a long time since I have read this many books by the same author so close together. I really think that this one, because of how controversial the last two books have been will have some people feeling too sensitive to want to read it, but others will be intrigued by it.
Another great book by Paul and I am looking forward to reading the rest of the series.
