How to become Pope

[nwhyte]

(This entry was originally posted in April 2005. I encourage readers to track down the books on eBay or elsewhere; would be interested to hear what others make of them

Comments

[tree_and_leaf]

The only one of these I've read is "Hadrian the Seventh", and even though I have a weakness for peculiar 19th and early 20th C novels on religious themes (I actually really enjoyed Newman's "Callista"), I can't really disagree with your assessment. Vicar of Christ sounds like I might quite enjoy it, though.

[owlfish]

When I saw the title of your post, and that it was by you, I briefly hoped you'd found a way to accurately predict the next pontiff by means of LibraryThing and GoodReads scores.

[nwhyte]

Hadn't thought of that! You may be interested to know that Kyril I (Morris West) is far ahead of the field on GoodReads, but only narrowly beats Hadrian VII (Rolfe/Corvo) on LibraryThing. Since we have already had an Eastern European, and as there is no English cardinal in the mix this year (for the first time since the early 19th century, I suspect), I don't think either book will turn out a good guide.

[inuitmonster]

Another book is "Hitler Has Won" by Frederic Mullaly, in which Adolf Hitler becomes Pope after winning the war in Europe. Though Hitler is not actually the book's protagonist as such so this does not really fit your model.