Kiely, B. (2015). The gospel of winter: A novel. San Francisco, CA: Margaret McElderry Books.

Aidan Donovan is a 16 year-old boy whose family is falling apart in front of him. His priest, Father Greg, begins to show him a lot of attention and he is the only adult that will take the time to listen to Aiden.  Aiden experiments with Adderall, his father’s wet bar, and the attentions of Father Greg.  Aidan’s  own life falls apart when he realizes that there is more to Father Greg’s attention than simple priestly concern.  Aidan turns to his friends for help to make sense of all that is going on. The novel ends with Aidan confronting Father Dooley and railing on the conspiracy to conceal the truth and allow the abuses to be covered up and the priests transferred.  Ultimately Aidan admits his secret.

The target audience for this book is 9^th – 12^th grade with a lexile of 780.  I found the story both intense and complicated.   It deals with sexual abuse within the Catholic Church, and the scandal and cover up that was all a part of that.  It addresses the shame and the confusion that occurs in the victims and the natural reaction of denial.  Some of the content might be a bit intense and quite tricky in a predominantly Catholic area.  I was unable to find any lesson suggestions for this text, however, I do think that it would work well for teaching about social issues.  For the child who has been abused, the characters would be extremely relatable.