Publisher's Weekly Review
Rader's tender, nuanced debut follows the life and loves of a dying priest and his compassion for a restless niece. After a long and outwardly successful career as a Catholic priest in Wisconsin, Paul Novak is facing terminal liver cancer. As his sister, Britta, take care of him, he searches for life's meaning. Paul is gay, and as his health declines, he shares his doubts with Britta about the choices he's made. He and Britta also discuss Britta's daughter, Maura, who is about to leave her husband and two children for a man she believes is the love of her life. Britta, who always accepted her brother's sexuality, becomes more aware of his inner discontent and tries to reassure him of the value in serving his community as a pastor while also poking fun at his "martyr complex." Paul grows increasingly restless, and asks her to accompany him to Rome, cuing flashbacks to a brief affair he had there with an Italian man in the '60s. While Rader draws a heavy-handed parallel between the unfulfilled Paul and Maura, readers will be touched by the portrait of Paul's rich interior life. Fans of The Great Believers will appreciate this story of heartfelt empathy. (Feb.)
Kirkus Review
Through the intertwined stories of a dying priest full of regrets, his caretaker sister still mourning her late husband, and her adult daughter torn between her family and a new man in her life, Rader's poignant debut novel explores the emotional costs of seeking and sacrificing romantic love."The official story of the life of Father Paul Novak was that he was a more or less happy man who'd lived an admirable life of service." But diagnosed with terminal liver cancer, the 70-year-old cleric is deeply troubled by his "thwarted heart." At the Sister Bay, Wisconsin, cottage he rents with his sister, Britta, Paul daydreams (with a little help from morphine) of "the men that could have been" if only he had mustered the courage to leave the priesthood and come out as he once tried to do in the summer of 1990. He grieves for his first and only love, Luca Aurecchio, a young Italian he met in 1970 while studying in Rome. Britta does her best to pull her brother out of his depression, but she has her own problems, missing her husband, Don, who died three years ago, and estranged from her daughter, Maura, who wants to leave her husband and two children, one of whom has special needs, for the possibility of true love. Traveling to Rome on a final pilgrimage, Paul gradually reveals to his sister his heartbreaking secret. These are the strongest and most moving sections of the novel as Paul struggles between getting the love he so desperately desires and remaining closeted in the church. Maura's parallel story is not quite so engrossing. She comes across as shallow and self-absorbed (she fails to reach out to her dying uncle), and her affair with a sexy older artist is a clichd trope. As Maura acknowledges, hers is the "unoriginal tale of a straight woman realizingthat she needed a certain kind of love to feel whole."An insightful and compassionate family drama about desire, love, and the courage it takes to live a full life. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
What are we supposed to do when what we want isn't possible unless we hurt others? In Rader's ambitious and deeply moving first novel, a beloved pastor and his niece confront this universal dilemma. It's July 2009, and 70-year-old Father Paul Novak, who refused chemo treatments three months earlier, will be gone by September. People know everything but the crucial thing about him: he regrets his life. Gifted with a cottage-stay in Door County, Wisconsin, by a parishioner, he's joined by lonely Britta, his widowed sister, who worries about her daughter, Maura. On the spur of the moment, brother and sister fly to Rome. Paul retraces and retells the momentous story of his last year studying scripture there in 1970. Then, in the final months of his life, he looks back and wishes he had had the courage to leave the priesthood to make a life with the young man he had fallen in love with. Meanwhile, Maura wrestles with leaving her husband and two children for her chance at real love. With indelible images, exquisite emotional nuance, and genuine wisdom, Rader explores faith, regret, shame, fear, and, most of all, love.--Mary Ellen Prindiville Copyright 2020 Booklist
