My Account

Anna and the Angel

Mar 31, 2025 | 2025 - Summer – Free, Book Reviews

Anna and the Angel

Author Eleanor Williams
Publisher Authentic Media £7.99
Format Parthian £10 pbk
ISBN 9781917140140

This is a delightful and original retelling of the apocryphal book of Tobit, vigorously reimagined and transported from the time of Israel’s exile in Assyria to contemporary south Wales. In the original, the focus is on Tobit himself, recently blind and dreadfully depressed, on Tobias his only son, and on Raphael (known as Azariah), the benign, heroic guardian angel. Tobias marries Sarah, a distant relative and, through prayer and obedience, family fortunes are restored, and Tobit is healed. In this retelling, the narrative is imaginatively given to Anna and Edna, the mothers of Tobias and Sarah, who correspond by email as the remarkable adventure unfolds. This allows the innermost feelings and concerns of two women who are mentioned in the biblical text, but who are otherwise peripheral to the original narrative, to be explored and celebrated. There is an enchanting freshness to the text which encourages the reader to recognise the hidden hand of God in guiding our lives. I certainly recommend Anna and the Angel, but I suggest it could be helpful to revisit the often-neglected book of Tobit first.

Reviewed by KATE BURTON

Apocrypha, novel

 

Lent at St Anselm’s: a tale of music, mystery and vegan cookery

Mar 4, 2025 | 2025 - Lent, Book Reviews

And finally, something rather different – a novel for Lent

 

Lent at St Anselm’s: a tale of music, mystery and vegan cookery

Author Peter D Toon
Publisher Eudaemonia Books
Format pbk
ISBN 9781068332401

Just before Lent Eleanor Foster, a retired music teacher, moves into St Anselm’s, a medieval alms-house in the cathedral city of Wiltonbury. The move is forced on her when the end of her part-time job coincides with a huge rise in the rent on her Soho flat, but she enjoys getting to know her new city. The Warden asks her to form a choir to sing in the hospital’s chapel, and she soon makes friends who share her interest in food and music. But not everyone is welcoming. Follow Eleanor and get to know her friends as they go through the challenges and trials of Lent to the joy of Easter morning.

A full review of this book will appear in Transforming Ministry Magazine later this year.

Peter Toon [petertoon@aol.com] writes:

Lent at St Anselm’s is published as an e-book and as a paperback. To obtain a copy, people can donate via my Justgiving page; .justgiving.com/page/peter-toon-lentatstanselms, send me a cheque or give me cash.   I have suggested a minimum donation of £5 for the e-book and £10 for the paperback, but donors are free to give whatever they can. I can deliver e-books anywhere, but will have to ask £2.50 postage and packing for those who want a paperback. You will be supporting The Friends of Canterbury Cathedral by buying a copy of this book.

Lent, Novel

 

The Book of Days

Oct 7, 2024 | 2024 - Winter – Free, Book Reviews

The Book of Days

Author Francesca Kay
Publisher Swift Press £16.99
Format hbk
ISBN 9781800753495

This beautifully written novel serves as a history of the Tudor Reformation spanning the critical years of 1546 and 1547, the death of Henry VIII and the new regime of Edward VI, which introduced stern Protestant legislation to eliminate popish idolatry. The setting is a west country village where the dying squire, symbolising perhaps the demise of Catholic England, has commissioned a chantry chapel and a marble family tomb. The enterprise is doomed, for the villagers, stirred by an itinerant preacher, are beginning to forsake the old ways. The aged priest, Sir Joselin, and the new chantry priest, William, faithful traditional Catholics, yet also pastoral servants exemplifying the love of God, become victims as the Bishop’s commissioners enter the village, intent on destruction of idols, glass and relics. Francesca Kay’s novel provides a superb, erudite portrait of Tudor religious life, especially from the Catholic perspective. It is an absorbing and truly helpful historical picture – an entertaining alternative to the academic descriptions we find in the textbooks of Eamon Duffy (e.g. The Stripping of the Altars). Highly recommended.

Reviewed by KATE BURTON

Novel

 

I, Julian

Oct 19, 2023 | 2023 - Winter – Free, Book Reviews

I, Julian

Author Claire Gilbert
Publisher Hodder & Stoughton £18.99
Format hbk
ISBN 9781399807524

A novel about an obscure 14th-century lady who spent most of her life in solitary confinement does not seem to be promising territory. But the lady is Julian of Norwich and the author is Claire Gilbert, fine writer and wise theologian, who succeeds splendidly in bringing the mysterious Julian to vibrant life. We follow Julian’s entire story from earliest childhood, when the Black Death struck her family, through marriage and motherhood – when another outbreak of plague left her a lonely widow. After receiving divine visions during her own near-fatal illness, she found her vocation as a hermit, bricked up forever in a cell adjacent to St Julian’s church. Here she was inspired to write Revelations of Divine Love, the spiritual manual we value to this day. Gilbert paints a vivid picture of medieval religious tension when fear of death and hell dominated people’s minds. Her triumph is to demonstrate how Julian left her negative childhood faith to become an assured theologian, utterly convinced that God’s wrath had been replaced by Christ’s overwhelming compassion and love on the cross. Highly recommended.

Reviewed by KATE BURTON

Novel

 

Essential information required for your profile. Click okay to complete.

Cancel Okay