By Steven J. Bergeron & Kathryn L. Bergeron
A detective. A priest trained as an exorcist. A forensic psychologist who doesn't believe in either. When all three uncover the same pattern—nineteen people in psychological crisis, all connected to one parish—they find themselves investigating something no professional framework was designed to explain.
The Church wants it buried. The evidence won't stay quiet.
✦ ✦ ✦Detective Michael Reeves doesn't believe in demons. Twenty years on the force have left him with a precise, evidence-based worldview — and nineteen case files that don't fit inside it. The cases span a year and a half: depression, violent episodes, intrusive thoughts, psychological collapse. All connected to St. Matthias Parish. All involving people who described the same terrifying experience: something in my head that isn't me.
Forced to partner with Father Thomas Hale — a young priest with exorcism authority the diocese quietly granted and now quietly regrets — and Dr. Sarah Chen, a forensic psychologist who's been tracking the same pattern from the clinical side, Reeves finds himself in an investigation where the evidence points somewhere he cannot go professionally, and somewhere the Church will not follow publicly.
The Permission is a Catholic mystery novel that takes both forensic investigation and spiritual warfare with equal seriousness. It asks what happens when grace is not an abstraction but a force that actually intervenes — and what it costs the people asked to witness it.
With 24 chapters and more than 25,000 words of theological appendices, this is Catholic fiction that respects its readers' intelligence and their faith.
The Donovan house was the kind of place that made you believe in the American dream — a white colonial on Ashford Lane with black shutters, a two-car garage, and a front porch where you could imagine someone sitting with coffee on Sunday mornings. The kind of house where nothing bad should happen.
Michael Reeves had learned that nothing bad ever happened in houses like this. Until it did.
He stood in the driveway at 6:47 a.m., his coffee cooling in a paper cup from the 7-Eleven two blocks over. His partner, Detective Lisa Moretti, was already inside with the uniforms, but Reeves had wanted a moment outside first. Twenty years on the force, and he still did this — stood in the cold morning air and tried to prepare himself for what comes after the sirens.
On the desk inside: a leather-bound journal, left open. The last entry, written the night before: It's not depression. I know depression. I've been there. This is different. This is like something else is in here with me. Like I'm not alone in my own head.
— Chapter 1: The Unraveling
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Find Your Amazon →The Permission is a Catholic mystery novel in which Detective Michael Reeves uncovers a pattern of psychological crises — nineteen cases in eighteen months — all connected to a single parish. Partnering with a priest trained in exorcism and a forensic psychologist, they discover evidence of coordinated demonic activity that powerful institutional forces want suppressed.
The Permission was written by Steven J. Bergeron and Kathryn L. Bergeron, co-authors who bring a deep engagement with Catholic theology, spiritual warfare, and the nature of transformative grace to their fiction.
Yes, the novel is written from a thoroughly Catholic worldview and takes the Church's actual teaching on spiritual warfare, exorcism, and grace seriously. The theological appendices (25,000+ words) engage Church documents and tradition directly. The novel doesn't sensationalize — it asks hard questions about institutional faith that loyal Catholics will recognize.
It's a Catholic mystery novel and spiritual thriller. It blends detective fiction with themes of spiritual warfare, exorcism, and institutional faith. Readers who enjoy Dean Koontz's Catholic novels, Michael D. O'Brien's Father Elijah, G.K. Chesterton's Father Brown mysteries, or Ralph McInerny's Catholic fiction series will find it compelling.
The Permission is available on Amazon in both Kindle eBook and paperback formats. It ships internationally to the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and more through Amazon's global network.
