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A review by girloflamancha
Death In Holy Orders by P.D. James
2.0
This started off pretty well, and at first I enjoyed the writing. But then I realized it was just boring. And the characters, for all the words spilled to describe them, were still flat and remained a bit of a mystery. I can’t really tell you what kind of man our main character is, except that he, and all the other characters we are supposed to like or sympathize with, are in fact extremely unlikeable. And then we get to the pedophilia. Look, I don’t know if the author is a pedophile or thinks pedophelia is no big deal (I can’t believe I am even writing this), and of course, her characters don’t necessarily reflect her own views, even when the reader is repeatedly hit over the head with how bad he should feel about this poor pedophile priest actually going to jail for his crimes, and how awful the guy who helped put him there is. In fact, it is heavily implied that, for being such a bully to the pedophile, he kinda deserved to be murdered. Again; does not mean that in real life P. D. James is super supportive of pedophiles. But she sure wrote a book where a MAJOR theme is that a priest fondling boys should be protected, the kids that testify against him must be lying, and the church must close rank and shelter their own from the law. Our hero - the freakin’ detective - is on the pedophile’s side. The pedophile is such a gentle man, why would anyone resent him fondling or raping boys? Did I mention? Nice guy, needs to be protected.
I don’t really know how I made it through once I realized this is agenda the novel was going to push. I guess I was hoping all of our main characters including the hero would eventually like... realize pedophelia is bad? Nah, that doesn’t happen. It’s literally a side plot invented to make us feel sympathy for the pedophile character because he did time and it was hard on him (?!). The victims are never considered. The hero and everyone else (except for the evil murder victim who dared help put this man behind bars) keep feeling bad for the pedophile and are so relieved he is placed in a community that would make him feel safe at the end.
I don’t really know how I made it through once I realized this is agenda the novel was going to push. I guess I was hoping all of our main characters including the hero would eventually like... realize pedophelia is bad? Nah, that doesn’t happen. It’s literally a side plot invented to make us feel sympathy for the pedophile character because he did time and it was hard on him (?!). The victims are never considered. The hero and everyone else (except for the evil murder victim who dared help put this man behind bars) keep feeling bad for the pedophile and are so relieved he is placed in a community that would make him feel safe at the end.