Priest #2
Author: Sierra Simone
Audiobook, Audible
Narrators: Jacob Morgan and Morae Brehon
(My review of Priest gives you a little insight about my personal background as Catholic – although relapsed – while reading and reviewing these books)
The book blurb tells you a lot about Sean Bell:
I’m not a good man, and I’ve never pretended to be. I don’t believe in goodness or God or any happy ending that isn’t paid for in advance.
What do I believe in? Money. Sex. Macallan 18.
They have words for men like me—playboy. Womanizer. Skirt chaser.
My brother used to be a priest, and he only has one word for me.
Sinner.
But Sean Bell is wrong. He is the son who accompanies his mother on her chemotherapy sessions and reads romance novels to her, the one is there to fix everything for everyone. He pretty much lost Faith in God when his only sister committed suicide because she was molested by their priest. How can he believe in a God that lets this happen?
One day, Sean is at a party where he meets his best friend Elijah. He decides to take a moment to get some air and he sees a beautiful young girl dressed in red. He’s mesmerized by her. They flirt. He throws all his charm at her but he loses track of where she is at the party. He thinks he will never see her again.
The next day he has to fix a major screw up in the deal he’s working on: the property they are in the process of buying is currently being occupied by a shelter run by none other than NUNS. Freaking nuns!! So this is a clusterfuck from hell, kinda literally. How can he fix this without the firm coming out as the people who evicted little old nuns? So he goes to the shelter to talk to them and see how he can relocate them without much fuss, and maybe with some good PR. But the universe throws a wrench at his plans: the “nun” who meets him is Zenny, the girl from the party. And, here’s the kicker – she is Elijah’s little sister all grown up who he hasn’t seen in a long time.
Now, Sean’s life is a little upside down. Elijah wants Sean to “protect” his little sister who is a postulant for that order and soon to become a nun and Zenny has ideas of her own. You see, she doesn’t want to give herself to God before she experiences the world. She wants to be sure that she knows what she is giving up for a life dedicated to the Church. She needs a teacher, a tutor in the arts of “living” and she asks Sean to be this tutor because she feels safe with him… and she had a little crush on him when she was a little. And yes, that will involve sex. Lots of it.
Well, well, well… it’s too much to ask for a self-confessed sinner not to lead this hot little number into temptation…
To be honest, I was kind of afraid to read this one. I really liked Priest and didn’t know how this story was not going to be just focused on the taboo part. I was wrong. I actually thought that Zenny was incredibly sensible (and so were her advisors) when she decided to “taste the world” before going into this life. I was a little more uncomfortable with the age gap (she’s 21, Sean is 36 and he met her as a little kid) than with the fact that she was a postulant. Exactly because she was a POSTULANT, unlike Father Bell who had already taken his vows.
I am also in awe as to how Sierra Simone navigates the issues of religion, Catholicism, Faith or lack of it, with such finesse and respect. This book has the discussions about religion that I thought would be more prevalent in the previous one in the series. Well done, Ms Simone.
I absolutely adored Sean. He is the bad boy with a heart of gold and his journey back to believing in something bigger is written perfectly. I also loved Zenny. She is so strong for someone her age and so determined to follow her own heart that you can only root for her – no matter what she chooses for her life.
And I have to say that I loved the Mother Superior – I went to Catholic school with very progressive nuns and she reminded me of some of the sisters that helped me become the woman I am today.
Highly recommend this one.
Again: if you are prone to pearl clutching, STAY AWAY… Or be a little progressive, open your mind and read a great book!
Possible triggers: sexual abuse by a priest, death of a parent due to cancer, death of a sibling by suicide, racism
Narration: Jacob Morgan. Period. A thousand stars. (Ms Morae literally narrates two text messages, so I can’t really say much about her.)
