cover image The Witness of St. Ansgar's

The Witness of St. Ansgar's

Francis W. Nielsen, . . Steerforth, $23.95 (238pp) ISBN 978-1-58642-100-7

Nielsen, who died 15 years ago and published his other works under a pseudonym, offers this fictionalized account of his adolescent years in a Bavarian Catholic parish in Manhattan in the 1930s. Though the subtitle calls it a novel, it is largely a series of vignettes that do not connect to any overarching plot. They all have the same setting—either St. Ansgar's church or Stanley Street, home to tenements full of Irish, Italian and German families. The witness of the title is Mario, a German-American teenager who is assistant to Friar Benigno, sacristan of St. Ansgar's and one of the many Franciscan brothers who minister to the parish. Told from Mario's perspective, the stories are poignant and personal—a secret history. While they do include a number of clichés and stereotypes (the pedophilic priest, the ennobled working-class immigrant), they paint an affectionate, textured portrait of imperfect friars and troubled parishioners. Some of the vignettes are heartbreakingly beautiful, particularly one that features Lizzie Talbot, a notoriously lazy housewife whose close friendship with a handsome young friar betters her as a person, but ultimately leads to tragedy. Central to each story is the abiding friendship between Mario and Benigno, both of whom evolve into endearing characters by the end of the book. (Feb.)