Description
Bestselling author Jane Christmas resolves to enter a convent to find out whether she is, as she puts it, "nun material". She also wants to understand why she has felt - and avoided - a siren call to religious life for so long. But just when she convinces herself to take the plunge, her longterm partner suddenly proposes marriage. Determined not to sideline her monastic dreams any longer, Christmas puts her engagement on the back burner and sets off on an extraordinary year-long adventure to four convents. With her trademark humour, verve and feistiness, Christmas relates how she revels in - and at times chafes and rails against - the silent, simple existence she has sought all of her life. When an unexpected and searing memory rears up, she is forced to confront both her past and her future.
The feisty memoir of Jane Christmas: should she marry the man she loves or become a nun?
About the Author
Jane Christmas is an acclaimed Canadian writer of travel memoirs: Incontinent on the Continent (2009 - aging mother and daughter travel to Italy), and What the Psychic Told the Pilgrim (2007 - "equal parts Nora Ephron and Bill Bryson"; "relentlessly smarter, funnier and holier than thou"). She now lives in Devon in the UK.
Reviews
"Her style is equal parts Nora Ephron and Bill Bryson" * Quill & Quire *
"Jane Christmas is, in a word, hilarious. She is definitely up there with Bill Bryson in the genre of funny travel writers." * Kingston-Waterloo Record *
Overall, I'd say I liked this book. It was interesting to have an inside view of daily life in a convent and I learned about the Anglican Church, a subject I knew absolutely zero about. I couldn't really warm up to the author, she felt very immature and very prone to naval gazing at the cost of her closest relationships. A good storyteller though, even if the "main character" in the story wasn't someone I cared for all that much. If I knew someone who was struggling with their faith I'd probably recommend they read this as it gives a modern woman's perspective on an ancient, patriarchal system, and how to discover a way to find where you fit on that spectrum. -- Sandra Hall * Netgalley and Good Reads *
This is the best kind of memoir, revealing, refreshing, and reflective enough to make readers turn many of the questions on themselves. A delightful trip down the road less travelled. -- ilene Cooper * Booklist *
"A lovely, heartfelt tale. Get thee to a bookstore and buy it." -- A . J. Jacobs, author of The Year of Living Biblically
"One doesn't necessarily think of spiritual autobiographies as being page-turners, but this zips along. Whizzing effortlessly from turmoil and rage about the treatment of women by the Anglican Church, to anxiety about the distressing lack of cosmetics in a convent, her exuberant humour makes this a refreshingly irreverent glimpse of monastic life." * The Daily Mail *
"A most worthwhile and memorable read" * The Church Times *
Book Information
ISBN 9780745956442
Author Jane Christmas
Format Paperback
Page Count 296
Imprint Lion Books
Publisher SPCK Publishing
Weight(grams) 323g
The feisty memoir of Jane Christmas: should she marry the man she loves or become a nun?
About the Author
Jane Christmas is an acclaimed Canadian writer of travel memoirs: Incontinent on the Continent (2009 - aging mother and daughter travel to Italy), and What the Psychic Told the Pilgrim (2007 - "equal parts Nora Ephron and Bill Bryson"; "relentlessly smarter, funnier and holier than thou"). She now lives in Devon in the UK.
Reviews
"Her style is equal parts Nora Ephron and Bill Bryson" * Quill & Quire *
"Jane Christmas is, in a word, hilarious. She is definitely up there with Bill Bryson in the genre of funny travel writers." * Kingston-Waterloo Record *
Overall, I'd say I liked this book. It was interesting to have an inside view of daily life in a convent and I learned about the Anglican Church, a subject I knew absolutely zero about. I couldn't really warm up to the author, she felt very immature and very prone to naval gazing at the cost of her closest relationships. A good storyteller though, even if the "main character" in the story wasn't someone I cared for all that much. If I knew someone who was struggling with their faith I'd probably recommend they read this as it gives a modern woman's perspective on an ancient, patriarchal system, and how to discover a way to find where you fit on that spectrum. -- Sandra Hall * Netgalley and Good Reads *
This is the best kind of memoir, revealing, refreshing, and reflective enough to make readers turn many of the questions on themselves. A delightful trip down the road less travelled. -- ilene Cooper * Booklist *
"A lovely, heartfelt tale. Get thee to a bookstore and buy it." -- A . J. Jacobs, author of The Year of Living Biblically
"One doesn't necessarily think of spiritual autobiographies as being page-turners, but this zips along. Whizzing effortlessly from turmoil and rage about the treatment of women by the Anglican Church, to anxiety about the distressing lack of cosmetics in a convent, her exuberant humour makes this a refreshingly irreverent glimpse of monastic life." * The Daily Mail *
"A most worthwhile and memorable read" * The Church Times *
Book Information
ISBN 9780745956442
Author Jane Christmas
Format Paperback
Page Count 296
Imprint Lion Books
Publisher SPCK Publishing
Weight(grams) 323g
