Cronin's easy storytelling art is [in Desmonde] applied to the true story of his lifelong friend Desmonde Fitzgerald. Desmonde is a brilliant singer with a strong other-worldly bent that leads him to the heights and the depths during a checkered career as priest, night-club singer, movie actor, missionary in India, and perennial spiritual quester. Desmonde's downers are generally caused by his uninvited attraction to the opposite sex. Cronin plays himself throughout—a prosperously devout and loyal friend who recounts Desmonde's progress with an odd mix of disapproval and wonder. Cronin's universe is morally black and white, defined by Catholic orthodoxy and the social assumptions of perhaps a half century ago. However, Desmonde is an enjoyable narrative of a half-rogue, half-saint which should please traditionalists.

Patricia Goodfellow, in a review of "Desmonde," in Library Journal, Vol. 100, No. 16, September 15, 1975, p. 1651.