The novel follows aging ex-Stasi private eye Lenya Fischer as she unravels a conspiracy to launder illicit gun and drug trafficking proceeds through Austrian lumber company Brunner Group and the Vatican Bank.
Literary critics have so far praised Brunner in the Black, with Publishers Weekly hailing that it moves at “breakneck speed” with “a lived-in authenticity” and that “Nichols deftly explores the relationship between religion and political power, the erosion of democratic institutions, and the rise of transnational networks that operate above the law.”
Kirkus Reviews called it “vast and immersive,” praised Lenya as “a brilliant protagonist,” and boasted that “readers will undoubtedly look forward to Lenya’s next case.”
In the novel, the radical reformer Pope uses politically motivated and fabricated criminal charges against his former anti-money laundering watchdog Orell Schneider—who is also the anti-hero protagonist’s lover—as part of a scheme to prevent the traditionalist faction of the Vatican from retaking control of the Papacy.
In real life, the Vatican under Pope Francis’ leadership charged former anti-money laundering watchdog Rene Bruelhart with abuse of office and charged former Secretariat of State chief Cardinal Angelo Becciu with embezzlement and money laundering.
Cardinal Becciu publicly claimed to have been framed by Pope Francis for political reasons and insisted that his money laundering scheme to overpay for London property was a covert operation approved by the Pope so the Vatican could discreetly pay a ransom to terrorists to free a kidnapped nun in Mali.
In public testimony while on trial in Vatican City, Bruelhart claimed he had received a conflict of interest waiver from the Holy See for his consulting work with Cardinal Becciu and that it was Pope Francis himself, and not Cardinal Becciu, who had pressured him to not flag the London property deal as suspicious.
Bruelhart was convicted of a lesser charge and sentenced only to a small fine, while Becciu was sentenced to several years in prison and prevented from participating in the 2025 conclave which selected the current Pope Leo XIV.
Prior to the scandal, Becciu was widely considered to be a top contender to succeed Francis as pope.
“Brunner in the Black is a work of fiction,” says the author Will Nichols, “and it does not allege anything about any real person, living or dead. It is not a roman à clef. Instead, it draws inspiration from my own experiences in private investigations, including those at a corporate intelligence firm where I reported directly to a former head of the financial intelligence units of Liechtenstein and Vatican City as well as a former head of the CIA’s Near East Division. This firm did not use any of the unlawful tactics described in the novel, though there are corporate intelligence firms that do. The truth about the Vatican’s London property scandal is for journalists to uncover. Fiction uses what ifs to tell philosophical truths larger than any one set of circumstances. I think of Brunner in the Black as Dashiell Hammett for the Jeffrey Epstein Era.”
Will Nichols is a career private investigator who spent a number of years in the Washington, DC metropolitan area before a recent move to Miami.
His grad school paper on amphetamine trafficking in the Syrian war was referenced in the French edition of Vanity Fair and his fiction writing has appeared in the UK literary magazine Ambit.