An American Requiem: God, My Father, and the War That Came Between Us: A National Book Award Winner

by James Carroll

Overview

A National Book Award Winner, New York Times bestselling author James Carroll's An American Requiem is "a tragic, moving book about a family torn apart by the Vietnam War, a young man looking for God, a writer finding his voice" (Boston Magazine).

An American Requiem is the story of one man's coming of age. But more than that, it is a coming to terms with the conflicts that disrupted many families, inflicting personal wounds that were also social, political, and religious.

James Carroll grew up in a Catholic family that seemed blessed. His father Joe had abandoned his own dream of becoming a priest to rise through the ranks of Hoover's FBI and then become one of the most powerful men in the Pentagon, the founder of the Defense Intelligence Agency. Young Jim lived the privileged life of a general's son, dating the daughter of a vice president and meeting the pope, all in the shadow of nuclear war, waiting for the red telephone to ring in his parents' house. He worshiped his father until Martin Luther King, Jr., the civil rights movement, turmoil in the Catholic Church, and then Vietnam combined to outweigh the bond between father and son. These were issues on which they would never agree.

Only after Carroll left the priesthood to become a writer and husband with children of his own did he come to understand fully the struggles his father had faced. In this work of nonfiction, the bestselling novelist draws on the skills he honed with nine much-admired novels to tell the story he was, literally, born to tell. An American Requiem is a benediction on his father's life, his family's struggles, and the legacies of an entire generation.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780395859933
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	04/01/1997
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	634,002
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.25(h) x 0.79(d)

About the Author

James Carroll was raised in Washington, D.C., and ordained to the Catholic priesthood in 1969. He served as a chaplain at Boston University from 1969 to 1974, then left the priesthood to become a writer. A distinguished scholar-
in-residence at Suffolk University, he is a columnist for the Boston Globe and a
regular contributor to the Daily Beast.

His critically admired books include Practicing Catholic, the National Book Award–winning An American Requiem, House of War, which won the first PEN/Galbraith Award, and the New York Times bestseller Constantine’s Sword, now an acclaimed documentary.

Editorial Reviews

"Autobiography at its best." — Publishers Weekly

"A tragic, moving book about a family torn apart by the Vietnam War, a young man looking for God, a writer finding his voice." — Boston Magazine

"I cannot recall being more touched by a book about a real family since John Gunther's Death Be Not Proud." — The Washington Post

"A flawlessly executed memoir." — National Book Award citation

"A work of the heart. . . . perhaps the most moving drama of fathers and sons that I have ever read."
— Washington Post Book World

"A magnificent portrayal of two noble men who broke each other's hearts." — Booklist

"A personal and political memoir in a class by itself. Rich in ideas and historical detail, a personal story that makes you think - about politics, parents, children and God." — USA Weekend

"One of those books that even as you are reading it, you know you will never forget. James Carroll is well recognized as a master storyteller. In this, his own story, he touches us as only a gifted writer can, and more so because it is true." — David McCullough

"Of all the memoirists who have set out to 'tell the truth' of a life and a crucial relationship, very few have ever succeeded so convincingly as James Carroll, in this poetic and achingly honest account of his lifelong struggle with his father to find a basis for mutual respect and love, an effort finally foundering on the Vietnam War. It is the story, never told better, of a generational faultline splitting households all across America. I couldn't put it down till its last, haunting sentence." — Daniel Ellsberg

From the Publisher

This richly plotted romantic thriller by the author of Mortal Friends blends a cast of well-drawn historical figuresJ. Edgar Hoover and Clyde Tolson, Joseph McCarthy and the Rosenbergs, among otherswith fictional heroes and villains to create a gripping study of an FBI man who can't stomach the fact that his duty is deception. Recruited from the Midwest and still possessed of idealistic notions of honor and loyalty (the time is 1949), agent Chris Malone arrives in Washington, D.C., where the government is consumed by paranoia about the secrets of the atom bomb. Once under Hoover's watchful eye, Malone goes deep undercover as a protocol officer in the State Department, assigned to help the anti-Communist cause by stealing a codebook from the Russian embassy. His guise includes a ``wife'' who operates with secrets and motives of her own, and becomes the object of his desire even as he wonders whether to trust her. Carroll etches his characters incisively, propelling them through a world fueled by blackmail and betrayal, and stacking his story with twists that strain credulity only in the breathless finale. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Carroll, a novelist (City Below, LJ 4/15/94) and Boston Globe columnist, presents an absorbing account of his youth and early adulthood in a family dominated by a strong-willed father, a country embroiled in a war in Vietnam, and a Roman Catholic faith caught up in the stress of reinventing itself through the Vatican II reforms. The tense relationship between father and son sets the stage for young James's equally difficult attempts to define himself as an American and as a Catholic priest. Carroll's description of his conflicts over Vietnam with his father (an FBI agent who subsequently became the founder of the Defense Intelligence Agency) will stand as an accurate reflection of family turmoil for countless readers who grew to maturity in the 1960s. Carroll offers a fascinating perspective on generational differences and the enormous challenges each young person faces when choosing a world view at odds with that of his or her parents. An exceptionally well-written work that is effective on many levels; highly recommended for academic and public libraries. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 1/96.]-John R. Vallely, Siena Coll. Lib., Loudonville, N.Y.

Library Journal

An ex-priest's confessional attempt to make peace with his dead father.

For nearly 20 years, novelist Carroll (The City Below, 1994; Memorial Bridge, 1991; etc.) barely talked to his father, the late lieutenant general Joseph F. Carroll, founding director of the Defense Intelligence Agency. They fell out over the war in Vietnam; over the way the younger Carroll conducted himself as a priest; and over the son's finally opting out of the priesthood, just as his father had done. Carroll confronts the demons left by his troubled relationship with his father and his church by telling his family's story, focusing especially on the political and religious turmoil that tore them apart in the 1960s. The book is sometimes embarrassingly heartfelt in a '60s bare-your-soul style that seemed fresh then but now sounds like the everyday kitsch of touchy-feely, tell-all television. Also, Carroll's lack of communication with his father, always a man of few words, forces him to speculate about the older man's emotions, just as he must speculate about what advice his father gave presidents on the war in Vietnam. But Carroll's honesty and sincerity, and the fascination of his story, triumph over any temptation to mock him as waxing too sentimental about his glory days as a radical campus priest counseling war resisters. Carroll argues persuasively that he is still that priest, albeit in a different role, and with a wife and children. And despite his falling out with both his father and his church, he thanks them for giving him the courage of his convictions and for making him a priest, even as they broke his heart.

A fresh retelling of old stories about a son's struggles with his father and his God, and a memoir that may help put more demons to rest for others of the '60s generation.

Kirkus Reviews