Cardinal: The Rise and Fall of George Pell

In 2018 Cardinal George Pell, Australia's most powerful Catholic, was found guilty of five sexual crimes against children and sentenced to six years' jail. He was the most senior Catholic figure in the world to be charged by police and convicted of child sex offences.

George Pell was a Ballarat boy who studied at Oxford and rose through the Catholic Church ranks to become adviser to Pope Francis and Vatican treasurer. He was expelled from the Pope's inner circle.

As an outspoken defender of Church orthodoxy, supported and championed by the powerful, Pell's ascendancy was seemingly unstoppable.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Abuse brought to light horrific stories about abuse of the most vulnerable. Pell portrayed himself as the first man in the Catholic Church to tackle the problem.

But questions about what the Cardinal knew, and when, persisted.

Louise Milligan pieces together decades of disturbing activities highlighting Pell's actions and cover-ups. The book is a testament to the most intimate stories of complainants. Many people entrusted their secrets to be told here for the first time.

Multi-award winning Cardinal reveals uncomfortable truths about a culture of entitlement, abuse of trust and how ambition can silence evil.

Louise Milligan is an investigative reporter for the ABC TV Four Corners program. She covered the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Abuse. Her exclusive stories for the ABC TV 7.30 program on the allegations against George Pell won her two Quill Awards from the Melbourne Press Club, including the Gold Quill for best story of the year, the highest honour in Victorian journalism. For this book, in 2017 she was awarded the Walkley Book Award and the Sir Owen Dixon Chambers Law Reporter of the Year Award. In 2018 Milligan was shortlisted for the Australian Book Industry Awards Small Publishers' Adult Book of the Year, Highly Commended in the Non-Fiction category for the Davitt Awards and won the Civic Choice Award for the Melbourne Prize for Literature. Milligan is Irish-born and was raised a devoted Catholic.