The Brothers' Lot
SynopsisPlot
Combining the spirit of Kingsley Amis’s Lucky Jim with a bawdy evisceration of hypocrisy in old-school Catholic education, The Brothers’ Lot is a comic satire that tells the story of the Brothers of Godly Coercion School for Young Boys of Meager Means, a dilapidated Dickensian institution run by an assemblage of eccentric, insane, and often nasty celibate Brothers. The school is in decline and the Brothers hunger for a miracle to move their founder, the Venerable Saorseach O’Rahilly, along the path to Sainthood. When a possible miracle presents itself, the Brothers fervently seize on it with the help of the ethically pliant Diocesan Investigator, himself hungry for a miracle to boost his career.
Story
About this book
The Brothers' Lot is set inside a fictional Catholic institution called the Brothers of Godly Coercion School for Young Boys of Meager Means. The school is falling apart, both physically and morally, and is run by a group of celibate Brothers who range from deeply eccentric to outright cruel. Their one hope for revival is the canonization of their founder, the Venerable Saorseach O'Rahilly, and they are desperate for a verified miracle to advance his case toward sainthood.
When an apparent miracle involving a statuette of the founder surfaces at the school, the Brothers move quickly to claim it as genuine. A Diocesan Investigator, eager to advance his own career, proves willing to cooperate. The school begins to profit from the attention the supposed miracle attracts, but the Brothers face a growing problem: students who have suffered abuse within the institution start to push back, threatening to expose what has really been happening behind the school's walls.
Kevin Holohan's debut novel uses broad comic satire to examine religious hypocrisy, institutional decay, and the gap between pious language and actual conduct within a Catholic educational setting in Ireland. The tone draws on a tradition of darkly funny institutional fiction, with the synopsis comparing its spirit to Kingsley Amis's Lucky Jim.
