Never buy books first thing in the morning before you have properly woken up. Browsing in my local bookshop recently, I added a previously unheard of Roddy Doyle book to my pile at the checkout, Roddy being one of my favourite authors. It was only when I got the book home and settled down to read it that I realised that what I had actually bought was The God Squad by Paddy Doyle. "Never heard of him", I thought, before deciding to read his book anyway since it had cost me £6.99.
Wise decision. According to the publisher's blurb in the front of the book, Doyle - Paddy, that is - is a leading disability activist in Ireland and a frequent contributor to all kinds of media on a wide range of issues. His television play Why do I Bother? was the first recipient of the Christy Brown Award for Literature and The God Squad won the Sunday Tribune Arts Award for Literature. The book is the story of Doyle's childhood, one which was as recent as the 1950's, that depicts an Ireland that a lot of people would probably rather not be revealed.
Doyle's parents died when he was a young child, his mother from cancer and his father committing suicide shortly afterwards. Four-year old Paddy was placed in an industrial school in the care of nuns, destined to remain there until he was fifteen.
Paddy's story is one of horrific, ritualised child abuse, both physical and sexual, the trauma of which eventually began to have physical manifestations that left Paddy hospitalised for many years. He endured brain surgeries but was left disabled, almost wholly dependent on a wheelchair.
Paddy's story is one of a frightened, maltreated child to whom very few people showed any sort of kindness or tolerance. In the notes on the back of the book, Doyle writes: "It is about society's abdication of responsibility to a child. The fact that I was that child and that the book is about my life is largely irrelevant. The probability is that there were and still are, thousands of "me's"". Perish the thought - and thank goodness that any such children have found so eloquent and compelling a spokesperson in Paddy Doyle.
This is a book that will send chills down your spine. It is the remarkable story of a child who survived a childhood that most of us could never conceive. More than that, it is a peek behind the closed doors of the Catholic Church and it's related institutions - and what is revealed is truly horrifying.
My only criticism of this book is that the end seemed to come very quickly. Paddy's life after his long hospitalisation to the present day is dealt with summarily in a brief epilogue that left me wanting to know more. However, thinking positively, this at least leaves room for a sequel. Since The God Squad was first published in 1988, it seems that a sequel is a long time coming. I live in hope.
Publisher: Corgi
ISBN: 0 552 13582 8
Price: £6.99 p/b
Date Reviewed: September 2002
My Rating: 3.5/5
