Some Rise by Sin

Expanding on several of the themes of his 2009 novel Crossers, Caputo’s latest is a thought-provoking story of unthinkable brutality. Former art history professor Timothy Riordan is the Catholic pastor of San Patricio, a remote village in the Mexican state of Sonora. The foothills of the Sierra Madre range in which San Patricio is located are torn by violent conflicts between drug cartels, local militias, the federal army, and police. Widely respected by the townspeople, Riordan also has the ear of military and intelligence authorities. But rather than helping him fulfill his call to serve and save his flock, Riordan’s network of connections produces deepening moral dilemmas. How, if at all, should information gained from positions of trust—including the confessional—be used in the hope of ameliorating suffering? What is the meaning of God in an apparently demonic world? As an emerging cartel called the Brotherhood wraps trafficking, murder, and mutilation in religious imagery, Riordan faces decisions that test him. A secondary narrative about expat doctor Lisette Moreno never fully gels, and the intricacies of Mexico’s shifting power balance can be difficult to follow. Yet poised as he is between unforgiving vows, lofty ideals, and searing chaos, Caputo’s Riordan is an everyman whose struggles illuminate the contradictions of human nature and the mysteries of faith. (May)