He lowered himself carefully to his knees on the brightly polished parquet floor, cupped his hands together in prayer and rested them on the side of the counterpane. As the cardinals assemble from around the world to choose his successor, we are introduced to the favourites to succeed the Pope and to their supporters and factions.

Lomeli’s role means he has to liaise with the outside world during their supposed confinement and his assistants prove to be able co-conspirators (and of course there are nuns again, providing the catering). Turns out that it had more depth than I anticipated, with religious theory and the state of the church at the forefront and all the nessecary twists and turns until the church elects its new pope. And whether their heads, their hearts, or their ambition will guide them to a decision will soon be seen. Will a traditionalist be elected, someone who will sweep away the reforms to the Roman Catholic Church that have been made over the previous 50 years?

It convinced me completely that CONCLAVE was Harris’ way of telling the Roman Catholic Church to grow up and, if they were going to insist on continuing to exist as a global force in the world, to enter the 21st century and deal with its realities. Europeans hold a huge advantage in electing the Pope, regardless of the number of Catholics they represent.

I was on the edge of my seat in similar fashion to when I was watching the movie Lincoln, and they were voting on the Emancipation Proclamation. Cardinal Lomeli left his apartment in the Palace of the Holy Office shortly before two in the morning and hurried through the darkened cloisters of the Vatican towards the bedroom of the Pope. Like its predecessors, "Conclave" transcends that tired genre with its careful working out of the moral complexities in a highly charged political event of great import - in this case, the election of a new Pope - and its consideration of the largest issues involved - in this case, the conflict between temporal and spiritual power.It is only the second time this year that I have had the experience of having to force myself to take off my headphones while listening to my audiobook. I was curious as to how a story as simple as the election of a Pope can be drawn out into a novel onto itself, but the author has succeeded in doing so most captivatingly. No, a month – 17 September, to be exact, after the Mass to commemorate the Impression of the Stigmata upon Saint Francis – the longest period he had gone without a private audience since the Pope had been elected.

So I’ve had my eye on Robert Harris’ Conclave for a while, with its promise to delve into the mysteries of this strange world. My health (and general demeanour) demand that I have an inordinate amount of sleep to remain some level of sanity! These four men vie as best they can before cardinals place their minds in God's hand to help them cast their ballots. That feels a little disingenuous, considering that the pontiff found dead in the opening chapter is discovered in the Casa Santa Marta, the hostel built by John Paul II to house cardinals during any future election. Clear parallels can be drawn between themes explored in Conclave and those in Harris’ Cicero trilogy – the obvious difference here being the contemporary Vatican setting and the bestowing of religious / quasi-political power – contrasting with the ancient Roman Senate and the goal of political / military / absolute power.

Sin ser una obra maestra a la altura de su trilogía sobre Cicerón, creo que es lo suficientemente interesante como para enganchar a muchos lectores. Adeyemi the African with strong views on the role of women and gay marriage, a man who believes that “homosexuals should be sent to prison in this world and to hell in the next” may well enter the history books as the first black pope and the first from the dark continent.