A good Catholic novel is true to life, and one of the most difficult truths is that some very bad people may continue in their evil—never in this life finding the repentance that might make for a happy ending. Fr. Alexander Lucie-Smith’s “The Chemist of Catania” is such a Catholic novel, showing us truth, but also justice. It deserves to be read widely and may well be the beginning of a great family saga of crime, punishment, sin, and redemption.
In my continuing exploration of contemporary Catholic fiction, I was delighted to discover that my friend Alexander Lucie-Smith had written a novel. Alexander is an English Catholic priest, so I was interested to see how he would handle a fictional tale. Would it be laden with an obvious theme—the story and characters being used as a sugar coating for his “message”? Would it be an extended parable, a fable or a sermon illustration? Would he fall into the trap of producing a clumsy allegory or yet another Tolkien-esque attempt at fantasy fiction with a theological subtext?
Instead I found an absorbing tale of a boy growing up in the slums of Sicily. Calogero’s father is a secretive man who, it turns out, is a nefarious Italian terrorist. A thuggish bully, Calogero learns the rudiments of crime from an early age and soon graduates from picking pockets and petty theft to a full blown life of violence, immorality, drug running, theft, and murder.
Calogero’s brother Rosario is a “good boy”—an altar server at the parish church, a good student, a loyal son, and also a victim of his brother’s violence. As the story develops, the contrast between Calogero and Rosario becomes the heart of the story, and their love-hate relationship drives the outward plot as a heartbeat gives life to the flesh.
Alexander Lucie-Smith tells the tale with a winning style that complements the content. He writes simply and directly, without frills and flourishes—almost as if the story is being told by an Italian peasant. His characterization and observation are accurate and convincing, and while the writer is a Catholic priest, there is no hint of sermonizing or bead-clutching piety. Father Lucie-Smith does not shy away from the immorality and violence in the lives of his young criminals. While he does not avoid the violence and immorality, neither does he indulge in explicit or titillating descriptions.
The Chemist of Catania is one of a planned series of books, and as I finished it I was anxious for the next installment. I also couldn’t help but compare Father Lucie-Smith’s story of Sicilian gangsters with Mario Puzo’s classic The Godfather. Having seen the film, but not read the book, I hurried to read Puzo’s novel to better compare them.
Puzo’s gangster saga also does not spare us the immorality and violence, but unlike Father Lucie-Smith, Puzo indulges in explicit scenes of sexuality and violence that are un-necessary. Puzo portrays Don Corleone as an essentially decent man despite his criminal activity. His loyalty to his family and friends is uppermost, and the killing, robbery, gambling, and prostitution are “just business.” Was I persuaded? I was not.
Father Lucie-Smith’s treatment of a villainous main character is more convincing. He presents Calogero as a fascinating, but a thoroughly unpleasant, manipulative, and evil person, while Puzo tries to make Vito Corleone a sympathetic, even admirable, character.
Can such stories be considered “Catholic fiction”? Certainly both take place within a deeply Catholic context. Calogero’s brother Rosario is a sympathetic Catholic character as is the parish priest, Don Georgio. Puzo also weaves into his story two good Catholics. Vito Corleone’s wife and his daughter-in-law Kay both attend mass daily, and in the final scene, Kay, who has converted to the Catholic faith, is seen praying for her husband Michael who has inherited Vito Corleone’s crown—a habit she learned from Mama Corleone.
However, a truly Catholic story is not a simple morality tale, a parable, or a fable. Nor does it find its worth just by including some redemptive characters. The wickedness in both stories forces us to re-consider the existence of bad Catholics: the risk of hell and the hope of heaven. Both Calogero and Vito Corleone are Catholics—very bad Catholics. What made them that way, and can they change?
Both Calogero and Don Corleone are the product of childhood violence: Calogero beaten by his terrorist father, and Vito Corleone orphaned by mafia mobsters when he was a boy.
A broken home, a violent childhood, poverty, or social deprivation are often blamed for criminal behavior, and while difficult circumstances invariably help to condition life choices, there remain many individuals who are brought up in the most dire circumstances who make positive choices—struggling to overcome their disadvantages to create a model life. In other words, some people drift from bad to worse. Others receive the grace of repentance to turn their lives around and overcome their disadvantages.
A Catholic novel is true to life, and one of the most difficult truths is that some very bad people may continue in their evil—never in this life finding the repentance that might make for a happy ending. The Catholic novel shows us truth, but it also shows us justice. When Don Corleone dies of a sudden heart attack—presumably unrepentant—we do not feel that it was unjust. We do hope that Mama Corleone’s continued prayers, however, may produce a more positive end result.
Father Lucie-Smith’s story is set in a parish of named for the Holy Souls in Purgatory. Perhaps that little hint indicates where his saga of lost souls is headed—and also that the happy ending of many Catholic stories may not be the sobbing conversion of the sinner, but the long, hard ascent of Mount Purgatory.
Father Lucie-Smith’s fiction deserves to be read widely. Depending how he handles the sequels, The Chemist of Catania may well be the beginning of a great family saga of crime, punishment, sin, and redemption.
The Chemist of Catania is available at Amazon.
Father Dwight Longenecker’s first novel, Renegade Priest, will be published later this year.
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