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The Sign of The Cross - Reviews

The Independent
Toibin's account of his brief, inglorious career as a pilgrim is richly comic. He reports his experiences, in an artfully simple style reminiscent of the young Hemmingway, but with more a sense of humour. The Sign of the Cross, like all genuinely good writings, is a treat. (David Lodge - London)
Times Literary Supplement
The pace is dizzying, and in the hands of the less gifted writer the sheer ambition of this itinerary would pall ...The writing is economical and deceptively plain, as cunningly artless as an Eric Rohmer film.
Daily Telegraph
[ Toibin shows ] that faith can reach to a depth that reason cannot govern and where the responseis not always voluntary...He leaves us with a powerful series of images described in the precise, eloquent prose that characterises his novels.
London Review of Books
Toibin is an exploratory, quizzical traveller. [W]e travel easily with his elegant prose and his unforced talent for atmospheric re-creation.
Observer
In this collection of sharp, open hearted essays... Toibin worries about being ill-formed, ill-equipped or unworthy of his task [ but he ] can give up feeling unworthy. FOr just some of these memories alone, I'd let him off six months in Purgatory.