Nahant native revisits town in fictional account of Catholic church scandal

NAHANT – Nahant has been reinvented in a new novel about the Catholic Church’s sex abuse scandal, and it has been re-named Egg Rock.Author Terrance Murphy, a Nahant native and Brighton resident, said it’s no mystery which North Shore towns have roles in his first novel, “Assumption City,” but he wanted to create some distance between his story and the facts that surrounded the scandal to afford a little poetic license. However, Murphy said he makes reference to the town’s Memorial Day parade, the Life Saving Station, the library and several houses that could be recognizable by a few clues.”It’s kind of a little latitude,” said Murphy. “This is fiction, not fact. It allows me to have fictional characters who bear no real relation to real people.”Murphy’s story opens with a suicide of a 17-year-old boy in December 2004 before backtracking to one week in August 2002 during the eruption of the sex abuse scandal in the church, when “blackmail and conspiracy surface, secrets are revealed, and events escalate to an unexpected and violent climax,” as he described it. Murphy said the action switches from “Faneuil,” which is in the book the Allston-Brighton area, “Little Rome,” the headquarters of the Boston archdiocese, and of course, Egg Rock.Murphy also makes mention of Revere, which he named “Dawes” after Paul Revere’s co-rider, and Lynn, Marblehead and Swampscott as “Swimset,” where there is a “Sqimway” and “Squim Neck.”Though “Assumption City” is fiction, Murphy said he began to write this story because he wanted to “write what I knew.” He spent time consulting at St. John’s Seminary in Brighton and as an internist at a Catholic hospital. He began writing the story in 2002 when the scandal was all around him. A Catholic himself who spent 200 days in vigil to save his church, Murphy said it was at times difficult to tell the story of the cover-up by the Catholic hierarchy and of the victims and accused.The “self-published” book is available on Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble. Murphy said he will be planning book signings and hopes to include Nahant in a trip.Kait Taylor can be reached at [email protected].