Facing the Tank

Evan Kirby, an American academic specialising in angelology and demonology, visits the English cathedral city of Barrowcester (pronounced Brewster) to pursue his studies at the cathedral’s ancient library.

There he finds that the chintzy perfection of the place masks a network of passionate secrets: one woman on the run from the cardinal who impregnated her, another haunted by her feral child, a young man breaking the news to his parents that he isn’t gay after all, a careworn son reluctantly consigning his mad mother to a home, a bishop with doubts, and a bishop’s mother with a serious cannabis cookie habit. Even as supernatural elements seem to conspire to wreck Evan’s latest undertaking, he finds himself surprised by love. The earthly paradise is revealed to be full of poisoned apples but one after another its inhabitants are offered a taste of sweet redemption.