He was nursed back to health by Isabel, wife of an Agentine diplomat, with whom he has an affair and a child.

When that Pope falls ill and it becomes apparent that he must be replaced, Rossini takes a leading role in the process.

Pamela Ruskin, in The Australian Jewish News wrote of the novel: "West gives us a picture, obviously of Pope John Paul II of a sick, cantankerous, stubborn, rigidly conservative man who should have been retired long before.

Perhaps over emotional and at times sentimental, this is a fine and thought-provoking novel by a writer consistently underrated by the literary critics for the unforgivable sin of being a bestseller.

"[2] In her literary study of West and his work, Maryanne Confoy noted: "...Eminence, is another moral exploration of the misuse of power in church politics...A central dilemma of the book is what happens when a Pope is rendered incapacitated and what might happen to the Church and the Magisterium in such an impasse.