Simon Called Peter is a novel by Robert Keable

Robert Keable

Robert Keable was a British novelist, formerly a missionary and priest in the Church of England. He resigned his ministry following his experiences in the First World War and caused a scandal with his 1921 novel Simon Called Peter, the tale of a priest's wartime affair with a young nurse...

 (1887–1927) which was a best-seller in 1921. The title is a reference to Simon Peter the apostle and first Pope of the Catholic Church.

The book was controversial at its introduction due to its sexual and religious content; it was made into a play by Jules Eckert Goodman and Edward Knoblock; it had a short run in Chicago

Chicago

Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

. The novel was followed by a sequel, Recompense, published in 1924 and made into a 1925 motion picture with the same title, directed by Harry Beaumont

Harry Beaumont

Harry Beaumont was an American film director, actor, and screenwriter. He worked for a variety of production companies including Fox, Goldwyn, Metro, Warner Brothers and MGM....

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This book is alluded to in The Great Gatsby

The Great Gatsby

The Great Gatsby is a novel by the American author F. Scott Fitzgerald. First published in1925, it is set on Long Island's North Shore and in New York City from spring to autumn of 1922....

. Nick Carraway, the narrator, reads a chapter and claims that "either it was terrible stuff or the whisky distorted things, because it didn't make any sense to me."