The story concerns Luca Rossini, a priest who in his early years was brutally
assaulted by the South American military, had an affair with the daughter
of the man
who
saved him, was whisked to the Vatican for his own safety, and under the patronage
and forgiveness of the Pope, eventually rose to the rank of Cardinal.
When Eminence begins, Luca is having a crisis of faith, and the Pope is dying. The rest of the story deals with the reactions of the various Cardinals as they head towards the election of a new Pope, especially after it is discovered that their conservative leader has had second thoughts about the way in which he ruled the Church.
Along the way, West throws everything into his melting pot: the Pope's stolen diary sold to the media, a diplomatic Cardinal who was also hand-in-glove with the military, a lesbian reporter, a middle-aged priest wanting to leave the Church because he has fallen in love with another man, a Cardinal involved with Opus Dei, and all the current issues that affect the Church. More than enough, along with Luca's dark night of the soul, and his undying love for the woman who rescued him, to have made a gripping story.
Yet page after page consists of long dialogues between the characters that skim the surface and never go into any depths. Too often, in fact, because we have the dialogue only and no indication as to which character is speaking, it's necessary to backtrack to see who is actually to talking to whom. There are scenes that ought to be high drama - but the actors remain polite. And at the climax of the story, when the Pope is finally elected, West allows the scene to be obscured in such a way, that I had to go back and check that I'd understood who had actually won.
Oh dear! perhaps my reading skills have deteriorated. Or perhaps West has written it all in a bit of a hurry, and forgotten to provide the necessary signals for the reader.