David A. Schwinghammer
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Books
· Soldier's Gap
· Soldier's Gap
· Soldier's Gap
· Soldier's Gap
Short Stories
· Mengele's Double, Chapter 12
· Fisher of Men, Chapter 11
· Mengele's Double, Chapter 11
· Honest Thief, Tender Murderer, Chapter 11.
· Mengele's Double, Chapter 10
· Honest Thief, Tender Murderer, Chapter 10
· Fisher of Men, Chapter 10
· Mengele's Double, Chapter 9
· Fisher of Men, Chapter Nine
· Soldier's Gap, Chapter Three
Articles
· The Jerk
· Bone-headed Supreme Court Decisions
· Republicans Work Hard at Creating Divisive Issues
· Pipestone: My Life in an Indian Boarding School, book review
· Auschwitz (Always Remember Your Name), book review
· Fahrenheit 2021-22
· Biden's Approval Rate Plummeting
· Mr. Trump, have you no sense of decency?
· Critical Race Theory
· Clueless Judge Compares AR-15's to Swiss Army Knives
Poetry
· Should I Take Ballet?
· Caboose
· The Girl Next Door
· Llama, Llama (dedicated to William Blake)
· The Terminal Booger
· Fashion
· Widow's Peak
· Myth
· Alumni Game
· Stradivarius
More poetry...
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David A. Schwinghammer, click here
to update your web pages on AuthorsDen.
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John Cornwell's memoir of his experiences in the seminary.
I would imagine Catholics and lapsed Catholics will find SEMINARY BOY more compelling than others because of the young boy''s obsession with sin and confession. Also, those who loved ANGELA''S ASHES will find similarities.
At the beginning of the book, John Cornwell is a pretty hard case for a pre adolescent. At one point he assaults a nun with a T-square after she drags him in off the playground for a "minor" offense. But he''s also an altar boy and his priest recommends him for the seminary.
He is sent to Cotton College in the West Midlands. At thirteen he''s getting a late start in the seminary and must catch up with his Latin. He is also inundated with temptation. When he has a nocturnal emission, he thinks he''s truly evil. He gets conflicting advice from the priests and faculty members. One tells him it''s not a sin as long as he doesn''t take pleasure in it; another, to his credit, tells John that masturbation is perfectly normal. But this is just the beginning of John''s torment. He falls in love with another boy. Although he was sexually assaulted prior to coming to Cotton, he doesn''t realize the full implications of a relationship with another boy. Once again he is tormented by his foul nature.
The priests at Cotton College run the gamut from Father Armishaw, a truly inspiring English instructor who owns a motorcycle, to an openly gay priest who tries to seduce young John. Interweaved within the story of the young boy trying to grow up in an alien world, we get a smidgeon of English Catholic history. After the Reformation, for instance, Catholic priests who wouldn''t take the loyalty oath were persecuted and had to hide in "priest holes." One of these priests wrote the inspiring hymn "Faith of Our Fathers" about this time in English history.
John Cornwell spends holidays and summer vacations with his family in a poor area of London. When his father leaves the family, his mother must scrap to make ends meet. She has a sort of love/hate relationship with John. She resents his arrogance but she''s also proud of her young seminarian and manages to scrape together the money to send him to Cotton.
SEMINARY BOY is a memoir that reads like a novel. I never went though the hell John Cornwell did in the seminary, but I can certainly relate to his dread of the confession box.
Dave Schwinghammer''s unconventional mystery (sometimes humorous, sometimes literary, sometimes a ghost story) is available on Authorsden and at Amazon.com, new and used. Please check the reviews. Thank you.
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Web Site:
Mystery Writer
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Don't think that I'll be reading it.
Ron
PS. I see that he wrote the book in 2006 according to the New York Times, and wrote bestseller called, Hitler's Pope. From my era, but it appears that he was in England.