A Glenstal monk’s memoir – and murder?

by Rose Rushe

A GLENSTAL Abbey Benedictine of 40 years, Brother Andrew Nugent has written a semi-autobiographical book, ’1968: Murder and Memoir’ that is part thriller and part memoir.
Published by Liberties Press in Dublin, the story is set in Student Revolution of France and captures “the troubled fear of a young man searching for justice”.
A regular published author, Andrew Nugent OSB took legal degrees at University College Dublin and King’s Inns, qualifying as a barrister. After a couple of years in legal practice, Nugent joined Glenstal Abbey and was ordained a priest in 1968.
Re his ‘Murder and Memoir’ release, he had spent the years of 1964 to 1968 studying theology at the University of Strasbourg.
In good bookstores since September with a tag of €13.99, this plotline to this thiller is a breathy read:

Spending their days apart, Eoin and Andrew meet each evening to share their adventures on the road. The purpose of their adventure is the broadening of their world by engaging strangers in conversation, and listening to their stories. It is this opening that brings Eoin to his downfall, as he disappears one evening, only to be discovered dead, in a shallow grave weeks later, propelling Andrew on a climatic hunt to find his killer.

In this fictionalised memoir, the drama of close friendship and the dynamic of young love between Andrew and his girlfriend Marianne, is played out against a traumatic murder mystery, where seasoned crime writer Andrew Nugent pens a strikingly tender depiction of friendship and self discovery.

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