The celibate - Michael Arditti

After a nervous collapse while serving at the altar, his college principal sends him on a placement to London where he enters an unfamiliar world of outcasts, down-and-outs, rent boys, religious fundamentalists and people with AIDS. In increasing despair, he embarks on a journey through the world of Jack the Ripper, the devastation of the Great Plague and the mysteries of his own family. As the past and present come full-circle, he finally understands the true meaning of Passion. This is an intelligent and emotive novel, potent with atmosphere and rich in ideas and insights. It employs a unique fictional structure which integrates the contemporary and the historical, the personal and the theological, the comic and the polemic in a revelatory way. On its initial publication, it was hailed as the debut of a major literary talent.