Thomas Keneally is an award-wining Australian historical novelist. He is best-known for his 15th novel, Schindler's Ark (1982) that won the Booker Prize and was made by Steven Spielberg into an award-winning movie in 1993. He has written effectively before about the impact of the organised church on Australian society. In Mmegi reviews have appeared of American Scoundrel: Love, War and Politics in Civil War America (2002) and Bettany's Book (2000) about a development worker in the Sudan. His other famous African-based book is To Asmara: A Novel of Africa (1989). I like his classic work, The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith (1972) that was made into a widely acclaimed film in 1980. Keneally has also published six works of non-fiction including The Great Shame on the loss of half of the Irish people in the 19th Century,
"An Angel in Australia" begins in 1939. Frank Darragh, a curate in a Sydney neighourbhood, was in turmoil about whether he should be a volunteer if Australia went to war. His father had been one in 1915 and conveyed the idea that this experience had been the true measure of him as a man. Frank would soon be a priest, but he feared he would be judged a military service evader. He was passing an ancient monsignor who was deep in thought when he suddenly roared a message as if from God "You, son, you must be a merciful confessor!" Frank felt it as a revelation; it was the most exalted message he had received in all his preparation for the priesthood.
