The Catholic Book Club discussion

5. Fiorella de Maria has graciously agreed to answer any questions we may have about her novel. Please post those questions here.

This is my first question to Fiorella:

The protagonist is banished from her family because she, as a child of five, fell asleep clinging to her dead father while she was watching over his corpse.

Is this a real reaction that you know has happened somewhere or at some time? If so, where or when did it happen? I find it a cruel behavior by the mother and siblings.

I have a question how the original country Malta influenced in your fiction?

Thank you for your questions! Touching a dead body was very taboo at the time. Windows and mirrors were also covered and she disturbs this ritual too. The family's behaviour certainly is cruel and sets the heroine on a very dark path, but you could interpret the mother's rejection of the child as a trauma reaction. I did know a mother who turned against her child after the death of the father, saying she wished that the child had died instead. It's heartbreaking but sadly, it happens 😔

Malta has had a huge influence on my fiction, particularly Poor Banished Children and We'll Never Tell Them

What place and what time do you mean?

When did you decide to include to Murat Harrad in the story? This pirate was the nightmare of the spanish monarchy our playwriter Lope de Vega wrote sonnets about him.

I grew up on stories about Maltese history, including the capture of many Maltese by pirates. I am also interested in the Great Siege and Malta's wartime heroism but We'll Never Tell Is set during WW1

A friend and maritime historian first introduced me to Murat Reis and he becomes the counterpoint to Fr Dan in the story (also a real figure). I was fascinated by the different trajectories of their lives. They could also be seen as the demonic and angelic influences on Warda's life.

We had a writer my friend Michael D. Greaney who wrote the book the ten batles that all catholic should Know for me the batle of Malta is the beggining of the the decline of the Otomans. Spain had been defeated in Djerba and we had with theam other defeats as Preveza, Argel and Castlenuovo. Tunisia was one of the few victories (1535) against the turkishs but Malta is really important because is with Soliman after would be Sziget and Lepanto with Selim II. There is a controversial about Malta the role of Spain during a period considered that the role of Viceroy Garcia was the guilty of the hipothetical fallen of Malta by the Turkish Nicholas C. Pratta and David W. Ball with this theory but the french historian Ferdinand Braudale in the Mediterranean in time of Philip II proved the decission of the Viceroy Garcia was right because he arrived at time and Louis de Wohl thought the same. At the beggining my first day of the Project was doing about the Malta's Knight i liked really La Valette and Romegas.

It is really interesting the topic of conscious the good and the bad Angel. Excellent point. We'll Never Tell Is set during WW1 reminded me to the english writer Rumer Godden although she did not write something clase.

Although my next question it is not about Poor banished children i would like to ask to the author. Recently i had bought other novel of Mrs. De Maria. I have bought "This thing of Darkness" cowritten with K.V. Turley. How this idea come to her mind? This novel reminded me powefully to Nosferatu whose remake was released to the theatres and cinemas soon and movies and Ed Wood and the shadow of the Vampire the Last with John Mallovich and Willem Dafoe.

Would you mind speaking about the Father Gabriel's novels? I am a lover of the detection novels.

Fiorella wrote: "A friend and maritime historian first introduced me to Murat Reis and he becomes the counterpoint to Fr Dan in the story (also a real figure)."

The English Wikipedia makes a mess with dates in its article about Murat Reis. It says that he was born in 1534, and in 1538 was assigned with the task of preventing the ships of the Holy League under the command of Andrea Doria from landing at Preveza... A real feat, if he was just 4 years old!

The Spanish Wikipedia makes the same mistake and also puts his death date at 1638, therefore he would be 104! The English Wikipedia puts his death date at 1609, at 74-75.

The French Wikipedia does not make those mistakes, although its article is shorter.

I watched the spanish Wikipedia and i surprised who lived a lot of years. But Fiorella did not commit any mistake. I did not say but there was an attempt of alliance among England and the turkishs pirates. I did not say but the King James is very beloved in Spain he protected the members of the Spanish army who wreckled in Scotland he signed a peace with us. He had an excellent relationship with the spanish ambassador Gondomar (the spanish machiavelli) and he excuted to Sir Walter Raleigh and expedición to the Orinoco he atacked the spanish territory. Besides he denied to enter in war with Spain. I had accepted the spanish match between the Princess Mary and the Prince Charles for wining England as allied.

KV introduced me to Bela Lugosi and the whole world of Hollywood horror, about which I knew very little initially. All the film research came from KV. Our decision to tell the story through the eyes of the sceptical Evi was very much a reflection of my own sceptical approach to the whole subject.

As to Fr Gabriel, I had always wanted to write a crime fiction series. I grew up reading Agatha Christie and Conan Doyle so Fr Gabriel was almost an accident waiting to happen 😄 I liked the idea of a priest detective but I wanted him to be convincingly a priest, in terms of the way he thinks and lives. So you don't just see him solving crimes, you see him saying Mass, preparing children for First Holy Communion, pleading with killers to repent.

Please would not you mind telling more i will read soon 😉🤭.

Well the Father Brown was a pioneer and the american comparison the Father Roger Dowling created by Ralph McInerny and the middle age detectives William of Baskerville, Friar Athelstan, Friar Cadfael and the nun Ludmilla and my beloved De Prada will kill me if i did not say the argentinian writer created one Father Metri.

Have you never thought to become a member of Detection Club? I think that with one of three novels one can become a member of the Detection Club. I do not say but my father wrote a book about the poisons in mystery literature. The book it is sold well and it had a translation to english (i must be proud of my relatives 😉)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

Thanks for the recommendation, I will look them up!

It is very dificult to get it the english edition is Out of print. My father wrote a second edition but it was not translated to English.

Fiorella, I have a question about the first part of the novel.
When Father Antoninus first meets Ursula, she has forgotten her name and her family. However, after Fr. Antoninus gives her the knife, she comes with her brother and seems to be living with her family. But there's nothing to explain how they discovered her identity. Can you clarify?

She never entirely leaves her family, she describes herself as an unwelcome guest at the table, and her mother describes her as a cockroach to be endured under her roof. It is her name she forgets. There is a cultural significance to Fr Antonin giving her a name of his own choosing as it implies a level of ownership.

Good reply 😁

Not related to this volume but any chance of reprints of The Cassandra Curse and Father William's Daughter. Both were excellent reads, but I lent both out and did not get them back.

Regarding this story, the sense of death coming so close and yet passing by and yet surviving, how did you come up with this concept and weave it in her story?

I have heard of "Cassandra's curse" i do not know if the author published in ARX Publishing? Of this publishing we read "Masaru" by Michael Thomas Cibenko and "The crónica of the world" by Nathan Sadasivan was a candidate to be read in the Catholic Book Club and "Centurion's daughter" by Justin Swanton.

Re reprints, Ignatius Press have read The Cassandra Curse. I am a bit shy about my juvenile work 🤭 but could ask IP if there was any interest

Re the omnipresent theme of death, it developed almost on its own. The book starts with the word 'death' and the book has a deathbed confession at its heart. Warda's life is so fraught with suffering and danger that death is never far away. I suppose it is inevitable that death haunts the book but hopefully with the possibility of redemption as its counterpoint.

Curiously one of the titles of the Juan Manuel de Prada's novela is "The death will find me". Although the main character of this novel is the opposite to Warda.

Manuel wrote: "Fiorella, I have a question about the first part of the novel.
When Father Antoninus first meets Ursula, she has forgotten her name and her family. However, after Fr. Antoninus gives her the knife,..."

I had the same question as Manuel -- I thought she was living alone, so it jarred me when she returned to her family / her brother showed up,

Fiorella, I thought that Omar and the renegade pirate had a lot in common -- how they treated Warda and seemed unwillingly attracted to her, and of course how they ended up. Of course there were significant differences in the settings, but again Warda seemed to have no way of escape except through killing them. Would you explain the purpose for this repetition of character and actions? Thanks!

There are similarities between omar and Ibrahim Reis in that they are both slave owners and treat Warda as their property. However, I think that Ibrahim has more complex feelings for Warda than omar. Omar is a spoilt younger son who sees Warda as little more than a toy to be dressed up and played with or thrown away and broken when she no longer entertains him.

Re the deaths of those characters, they are provoked by different situations. Warda never plans to kill Omar, that's why there is - possibly - a question mark over whether Warda is culpable. She may not have been fully in control of her senses at the time. With Ibrahim she makes a considered decision at the pleading of others, to bring down the ship to save more souls from being captured. Ibrahim is collateral damage to some extent, but so is Warda as she brings down the ship in the belief that she will also perish.

It is a self-sacrifice? 😲

Yes, she expects to go down with the ship. She is inspired in part by Fr Dan's sacrifice for her, which she finally understands when the English sailors ask her to save their people, even though it will cost her everything

Hi, Fiorella: I'm about 120 pages in so far, and have just gotten to the slave market. The brutality takes your breath away. How are you able to write about such dark topics? It never feels gratuitous, just matter of fact, but I'm struggling to read it. Likewise in your other novel, (view spoiler)[This Thing of Darkness, the death scene in the camp left me sobbing! (hide spoiler)] I would love to know what's your secret.

Wow Emmy, that's a tough question but thanks for asking 🙂 the first admission I have to make is that I had no idea when I started the research for Poor Banished Children, just how dark a journey I was embarking upon. I had always wanted to write a story about the Mediterranean slave trade as I am of slave ancestry but I honestly did not appreciate quite how overwhelmingly cruel it was. It proved to be a painful journey, particularly because I was writing about the sufferings of my own people, but I wanted to do justice to the million souls who were taken into slavery during that period.

In terms of writing about dark topics more generally, without wishing to give away too much about my own past, it can be quite cathartic. As Christians, we know that the resurrection follows the agony of the cross, and I try to draw on that understanding in my writing. However much the heroine (or hero) suffers, the hope of redemption is never far away.

I'm sorry, Fiorella! That was probably too direct of a question to ask.

I suppose I also didn't realize how brutal this would be. I had read Sabatini's The Sea-Hawk with my grandfather a few years ago, but while both books discuss the slave trade and there's some difficult topics addressed in Sabatini's book, it doesn't dive nearly as deep as your narrative.

I think you definitely did justice to those who suffered in slavery. Your depictions were thoughtful, painful, and deeply respectful.

And without giving away too much of my own past either, there is something deeply cathartic about reading about suffering, too. It makes us feel as though we're connected to someone else. And as you say, there is always the hope of the resurrection in the end.

I normally don't like to read books that get too "intense" or "violent", but yours have been an extreme exception and I look forward to reading more that you have written. When I finished This Thing of Darkness, I told my friend that no one writes horror like a Catholic, because no one understands the depth and nature of good and evil like a Catholic does.

Thanks for answering my question!

It is very interesating
that Emmy says when she mentioned Raphael Sabbatini i remembered that there was a movie played by Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland of white slaves who went to work to America they were catholic https://www.religionenlibertad.com/cu... A part of this article of the digital magazine Religión en Libertad i recomended a book written by José Antonio Crespo Franceshttps://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5... about the white slaves impriosioned by the muslims and for the protestants in England. I apologize for speaking about this controversial topic.

It is curious that Emmy spoke about "This thing of Darkness" because it will be my next reading if i liked it i will nominate for this group. This discussion is being excellent and with a lot participation

I have another question for Mrs. De Maria The Professor Manuel Alfonseca and me speaking about this. Do you believe that your characters have own life and they take their decisiones or choices or all it is produced by the author? Thanks.

Believe it or not, Fonch, I already nominated it! I would love to read it again and discuss with the group! It was easily one of the best books I read in 2023!

If i could do it. I will vote for "This thing of Darkness" i am very satisfied with this discussion. A long time ago that i did not enjoy so much speaking about a book in this group.

This is my first discussion in this group and I'm so glad I've joined in!

This is an excellent group but the discussions are good when the members of the group are active and they participate in the discussion. This is the case and for this reason the discussion is being a total success.

It is also the unity between the youngest generations and the most mature generations. His interactions are necessary for the success of this group in my country nowadays the people are too soy and they not participate in any activity. I have the impression that only are interested in the cellular. Besides there was a lot of years of Liberal (i employ the american definition not the european definition) indoctrine although some are optimistic about the young people are giving up the current ideologies although we must Hard work a lot.

Interesting question re the life of the character. This may sound a bit mad, but I completely believe that my characters take on a life of their own. As the author, I create them, obviously, but then I leave them to develop. It sometimes means that they do things I did not intend. For example, in one of my mystery stories, I intended the killer to break down and beg the forgiveness of his victim's daughter, but when it came to that moment, I realised that he was too heartless and too arrogant to be capable of remorse. It is always more interesting if the author has some surprises too 😀