HISTORY

The Convent: A Novel by Panos Karnezis

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


An isolated convent in the Spanish sierra...home to 6 nuns of varying ages, whose lives are devoted to God, reflection and solitude....Everything changes the day that a baby is found, in a padded suitcase, on the front steps.

Everything changes..the world comes to the convent in an emotional sense, at least. Jealousy, cruelty, zealotry, pride...make for a heady, deadly mix..The MOTHER SUPERIOR is at the center of the storm, having kept her own secret for many years. ....in the misguided belief that the orphaned child is the expiation of her own past sin...she delves into madness and shame...wherein the story becomes itself. Too many tales of this ilk become tacky..this one does not

This book is not a religious screed, nor is it a tabloid expose...it is a story of 6 women living isolated lives whose world is suddenly shattered from without...how each one deals with this new "truth". This book won't set the world on fire..but may give a reader food for thought...regarding the sanctity of the Church..and the price it exacts from its "sons & daughters"

3 Stars