Rating: 
Summary: From His Own Past
Review: A first novel by a friar turned lawyer turned writer, Brodrick has created a highly readable story of the continuing effect the Nazi era has on our present day. Filled with a number of moving characters, this novel attempts to show us how the intricacies of family and loyalty are strained by the events and lasting scars of persecution and war. In this, it succeeds very well. In other ways, however, it succeeds less well.As a creator of character, Mr. Brodrick shows himself to be quite skilled. I found most of his characters to be emotionally engaging and interesting. His plot, on the other hand, seemed to rely more on coincidence than on real surprise and he doesn't manipulate coincidence quite on the level of a Dickens or Irving. This is not a true mystery or thriller. Clearly, it is based on Brodrick's own experience and that power remains with it. I wonder what Brodrick has left to bring to his next novel. Perhaps being less trapped by his own history he will construct a better one. Still, if a reader looking more for an exploration of emotion than a perfect plot, this is a novel worth reading.
Rating:
Summary: From His Own Past
Review: A first novel by a friar turned lawyer turned writer, Brodrick has created a highly readable story of the continuing effect the Nazi era has on our present day. Filled with a number of moving characters, this novel attempts to show us how the intricacies of family and loyalty are strained by the events and lasting scars of persecution and war. In this, it succeeds very well. In other ways, however, it succeeds less well. As a creator of character, Mr. Brodrick shows himself to be quite skilled. I found most of his characters to be emotionally engaging and interesting. His plot, on the other hand, seemed to rely more on coincidence than on real surprise and he doesn't manipulate coincidence quite on the level of a Dickens or Irving. This is not a true mystery or thriller. Clearly, it is based on Brodrick's own experience and that power remains with it. I wonder what Brodrick has left to bring to his next novel. Perhaps being less trapped by his own history he will construct a better one. Still, if a reader looking more for an exploration of emotion than a perfect plot, this is a novel worth reading.
Rating: 
Summary: A NOTEWORTHY DEBUT AND READING
Review: A former Augustinian friar, William Brodrick well knows the focus of his compelling and ultra literate first novel. Voice performer Graeme Malcolm, a veteran of the Broadway stage, also knows his oeuvre well, and delivers a moving, highly listenable reading. When an elderly man comes to Father Anselm's door seeking sanctuary, the prelate welcomes him to Lakewood Priory. Little does he know or would he have cause to imagine that his visitor, Eduard Schwermann, is a suspected Nazi war criminal. Elsewhere, Agnes Embleton has little of mortal life remaining. Thus, she shares a half century old secret with her granddaughter, Lucy. Some fifty years ago Agnes had lived in occupied Paris where she worked with an underground group dedicated to saving Jewish children. But, it was not long before her group was discovered by SS officer Eduard Schwermann. Thus begins an intertwining mystery that will hold listeners in thrall. Father Anselm learns that the Church has sheltered Schwermann in the past. Further, it assisted him in escaping to Britain and safety in 1944. Why? How could this be? In addition, Lucy finds herself exploring her grandmother's once hidden past, little knowing the stunning facts she will unearth. "The 6th Lamentation" is a mystery and a morality tale - a noteworthy debut. - Gail Cooke
Rating:
Summary: A NOTEWORTHY DEBUT AND READING
Review: A former Augustinian friar, William Brodrick well knows the focus of his compelling and ultra literate first novel. Voice performer Graeme Malcolm, a veteran of the Broadway stage, also knows his oeuvre well, and delivers a moving, highly listenable reading. When an elderly man comes to Father Anselm's door seeking sanctuary, the prelate welcomes him to Lakewood Priory. Little does he know or would he have cause to imagine that his visitor, Eduard Schwermann, is a suspected Nazi war criminal. Elsewhere, Agnes Embleton has little of mortal life remaining. Thus, she shares a half century old secret with her granddaughter, Lucy. Some fifty years ago Agnes had lived in occupied Paris where she worked with an underground group dedicated to saving Jewish children. But, it was not long before her group was discovered by SS officer Eduard Schwermann. Thus begins an intertwining mystery that will hold listeners in thrall. Father Anselm learns that the Church has sheltered Schwermann in the past. Further, it assisted him in escaping to Britain and safety in 1944. Why? How could this be? In addition, Lucy finds herself exploring her grandmother's once hidden past, little knowing the stunning facts she will unearth. "The 6th Lamentation" is a mystery and a morality tale - a noteworthy debut. - Gail Cooke
Rating:
Summary: gripping
Review: although the recounting of nazi atrocities was unsettling, the evocation of paris in the occupation years and the eventual coming to justice of war criminals, was crafted in a stunning way. learning that the author's mother to whom he dedicates the book, had died of motor neuron disease made those scenes all the more sad, but the downward spiral is lovingly chronicled. i couldn't put it down, finding the truth unravelling, reading far past my bedtime.
Rating:
Summary: An intriguing tale of wartime loyalties
Review: An old woman with a secret is dying, an old man has just claimed sanctuary in a monastery, a journalist has just discovered hidden archives about an SS officer and his French collaborator being granted entry to England after the war. Are all of these things connected? We know they must be, through the conventions of the novel, but William Brodrick succeeds in keeping the suspense up and throwing a few surprises in masterfully. So, it's a gripping yarn. But what sets this apart from other current mysteries, is the wonderful language. I must admit, it took a few pages to settle into, but once you're there you are hooked for good. Beyond the straight tale, we also see into our character's lives, feel for them, watch them grow. In short, we have real believable characters within a wonderful story. William Brodrick has also created a character - a monk named Father Anselm - seemingly losely based on himself, who could well become a great mystery character if Mr. Brodrick so chooses. William Brodrick was a monk before returning to lay life as a lawyer; Father Anselm is an ex-lawyer turned monk but he isn't completely satisfied with that life either. This conflict is (I'm sure deliberately) unresolved by the novel's end leaving room for growth. I certainly look forward to meeting him again. This book reminded me a little of Donna Tartt's "The Secret History". Both books are by first time novelists, both have secrecy as a major theme and both are, what we might term, literary thrillers. It's a comparison I hope neither of the authors would mind because these are both great books. I highly recommend "The 6th Lamentation" to anyone interested in well-written books and/or great mysteries.
Rating:
Summary: Dense, Difficult but Ultimately Rewarding!
Review: Dubbed a "literary thriller" by its publisher, William Brodrick's novel The Sixth Lamentation will captivate you and move you to tears - no matter how you ultimately classify it. Revenge, betrayal, loyalty, faith and, most significantly, redemption, all play a part in a book that will both provoke and haunt you long after you have closed its pages.
The novel features dual story lines that eventually intersect, indeed, interweave, again and again in shocking and affecting ways. It's 1995 and Eduard Schwermann, an alleged Nazi war criminal who has been exposed, seeks sanctuary at Lakewood Priory an Augustinian monastery in Great Britain. The negative publicity attending Schwermann's arrival at Lakewood - and the hullabaloo of the imminent war crimes trial - forces the ecclesiastical authorities to launch an investigation of their own. Father Anselm, a former barrister-turned monk, seems like just the man for the job. As the priest probes the dark history of the German occupation of Paris during World War II and the subsequent "relocation" of hundreds of thousands of French Jews to the camps in the East, he makes a disturbing discovery; this is apparently not the first time that the church has come to Schwermann's rescue. Indeed, Anselm discovers, back in 1944 it helped him escape France and assisted him in establishing a new identity in England. Do Anselm's superiors want the monk to unearth the truth or are they abetting yet another cover-up?
Meanwhile in London, the elderly Agnes Aubret is dying from motor neuron disease. As the old woman's condition worsens, and before her inevitable dissolution, she imparts a momentous secret to her twenty-five-year-old granddaughter, Lucy. During her youth in Paris, Agnes was part of a resistance group known as the "Round Table" which worked to smuggle Jewish children out of France. The group was betrayed by one of its own members working in collaboration with - you guessed it - an SS officer by the name of Eduard Schwermann. One of the casualties of that betrayal was Agnes' infant son, Robert. Anselm and Lucy cross paths as they both seek to make sense of the present by coming to grips with the past. The pair soon discovers that no one and no thing is quite what it seems, and no human motivation ever operates strictly on one level.
No brief summary could even begin to do justice to the dense and complex plot of The Sixth Lamentation. This is a novel that will require lots of time, effort and attention on the part of the reader. But it is also a novel that will repay that effort with insight and understanding again and again in the course of its pages. What Broderick has accomplished here is a moving reflection on the power of evil, the tragedy of human weakness, and, finally, on the redeeming power of time and self-sacrifice. Novels like this are rare gifts. They are, as Broderick writes, like " ... timeless, enduring, secret benedictions." (...).
Rating:
Summary: I agree
Review: I agree with Lucretia Nesbitt. This book is fantastic. Words fail me. If you can read this and not be moved, you'd better go ahead and be embalmed. Sign me Aidan Firstearth.
Rating:
Summary: Remarkable!
Review: I enjoyed this book immensely.......you want to know what transpires next, at the same time, you don't want to finish the book. Kind of an oxymoron, I guess. Mr. Brodrick, I sincerely hope you're working on another book...I'll be looking forward to it.
Rating:
Summary: New author, excellent work
Review: It's always a pleasant surprise to pick up a book by a new author and to find that you enjoy it tremendously. This is what happened with this book, for I just happened to see it sitting on a table of new paperbacks and, intrigued by the subject, glaced quickly through it. The writng, descriptive and lyrical, compelled me to purchase this book, and I am very happy that I did. There is a well-constructed plot, with numerous twists and turns, and confusions of identity. The reader sees the main characters go off in diferent directions, but in the end, everything comes together in a very bittersweet ending. We ned writers with this type of prose virtuosity, and I for one will look forward to the next work written by this gentleman.
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