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

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What an ensemble of narrators: Aoife Duffin; Gertrude Toma; Barry Barnes; Stephen Hogan; Barnaby Edwards; Laurence Bouvard; David John; Roberto Davide; Thomas Hill. Based on a true story, My Father’s House is a powerful thriller from a master of historical fiction. He put his life at risk using his creative tactics against the Nazis, to help Jews and escaped allied prisoners to flee.

During the Nazi occupation of Rome it housed not only the Pope and the Vatican's clergy, but also various diplomats and foreigners who had fled there for safety. The timelines building up to the escape are told through their viewpoints, some of them interviews after the event, which adds to the feel of authenticity. The book is based on the true story of Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty who, along with others, risked his life to smuggle thousands of Jews and escaped Allied prisoners out of Italy. The danger and peril was ever so real and the author does an excellent job of showing the reader that with scenes that set one's heart beating faster.The final chase scene has a cinematic quality with high stakes and increasing tension and reminded me of Donald Sutherland in ‘don’t look now,’ with the dark alleys, water and piazzas at night.

On Christmas Eve, 1943, a mission (code name Rendimento) was run by members of a choir and a network of accomplices. The story is set in Nazi-occupied Rome during December 1943 and unfolds as a countdown towards 'a mission'.But Hauptmann's net begins closing in on the Escape Line and the need for a terrifyingly audacious mission grows critical. As a note, Pope Pius XII seemed to know of O'Flaherty's activities and knew what he did could endanger the Vatican, but allowed him to continue. O’Connor has assembled a wonderful cast, which includes Contessa Giovanna Landini, mourning her husband; Delia Kiernan, wife of the senior Irish diplomat to the Vatican, a singer with the voice of an angel; Marianna de Vries, a freelance journalist; Enzo Angelucci, an Italian newsagent, and Major Sam Derry, an escaped British POW. And it was as he was talking about some of his other books that I realised just how long I’ve been reading him. He is the author of the novels Cowboys and Indians (short-listed for the Whitbread Prize), Desperadoes, The Salesman, Inishowen, Star of the Sea and Redemption Falls, as well as a number of bestselling works of non-fiction.

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. Four thousand frightened prisoners crammed like abused beasts, half starved, into a couple of barbed-wired stony fields. But, only at times, the different excerpts of the interviews that was written through out did confuse me a little bit of what the connection was. Diplomats, refugees, and escaped Allied prisoners flee for protection into Vatican City, at one fifth of a square mile the world’s smallest state, a neutral, independent country within Rome. It's thought that through O'Flaherty, with the help of his choir and surrounding network, over 6,000 people were saved.But Hauptmann’s net begins closing in and the need for a terrifyingly audacious mission grows critical. I’m happy I investigated this ‘great escape’ novel set in the Vatican during WW2 and featuring an Irishman and an escape route I’d never heard of before. Vatican City was a neutral zone that housed a huge variety of people coming into the city for protection and a place to find that their life might go on. Although parts could have gone on longer, IMHO, other parts seemed to need a bit of editing or shortening.

One of the standout parts of the book for me was a section entitled ‘The Hunstman’ in which the author gives us a chilling insight into Hauptmann’s domestic life in his heavily fortified home in a former museum that is almost like a prison, and to the motivation for his vile actions. And as it’s Reading Ireland month hosted by Cathy at 746books, it seemed as good as time as any to get stuck in.

The villain of the piece is Paul Hauptmann, Hitler's representative in Rome, and a man with a penchant for torture. The novel provides wonderful background on each character and follows each of them through the action. A hugely entertaining book about the grand scope of friendship and love, it is also, movingly – at times, astonishingly – a story of transience, loss and true loyalty. His home is Vatican City, the world's smallest state, a neutral, independent country within Rome where the occupiers hold no sway. Based on a true story, and several real characters, My Father’s House opens in September 1943 with wartime Rome as its memorable backdrop.