6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Mystery of the miracles, April 20, 2005
The Annunciation is an intriguing book, a tale of the universal search for meaning and spirituality in a materialistic world. Before starting, I expected the plot to be somewhat farfetched, but having worked with young teens for a long time, I can see that something like this could happen. Each of the major characters lacks something important in his/her life, and it takes a tragedy for them each to learn that their resolutions lie not in miracles but in themselves and in each other. The truth of the central mystery remains hidden till the novel's end, and even then, not all questions are answered or problems solved. Thought provoking and skillfully crafted.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Not what I expected..., January 30, 2005
This book was not what I expected but was wonderful nevertheless.. Francesca Dunn is a 14 year old girl on the cusp of becoming a woman but still very much a child, her parents have recently divorced and she feels abandoned by her previously doting father whose dream it was for Francesca to be a famous celloist.. She begins to realize she is not the prodigy her father had hoped for, at about the same time as a homeless man at the soup kitchen where she works announces that she is the virgin mother.. a frenzy of adulation ensues.. making Francesca feel special once again and her mother doubt her daughters sanity.. told in the alternating pov's of Anne the mother, Francesca, her bestfriend Sid and the homeless man Chester.. Excellent I highly recommend this book.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
How can he be so sure how God works, April 25, 2004
The meaning of "annunciation" in the Christian religion is the announcement to the Virgin Mary by the angel Gabriel of the incarnation of Christ. This basic tenant provides the backdrop to The Annunciation of Francesca Dunn, a gorgeously written but slightly uneven novel by Janis Hallowell. Told in sparingly almost disparate prose, and full of delicate imagery and rich emotion, the story poses fundamental questions of science and faith and conveys the ever-present dichotomies that exist between the two. Told in irregular chapters by four different characters, we witness Francesca Dunn's startling transformation into a Virgin Mother - one who is gifted and is given the gift to perform miracles on members of a small community in Connecticut.
This is a story about the elusive nature of the spirit and how people try to reconcile their faith and religious beliefs in a modern, secular, twenty first century world where the world of science takes precedence. The novel begins with the voice of Chester, the homeless man. He names himself the protector of Francesca and he believes she is the Blessed Virgin after seeing her perform miracles on his fellow homeless friends in a local cafe. For Chester, the virgin becomes his only guide, the only one to tell him what to do. Francesca, the centerpiece of the novel is an average, somewhat spoilt fourteen year-old who plays the cello and wishes that her mother would pay more attention to her. When she releases that she has the power to change people's lives and can hold the mystery of life in her hands, she becomes a celebrity and a deity; but no one ultimately knows exactly what kind of power that Francesca possesses.
Another narrative voice is Sid, Francesca's troubled girlfriend who has her own demons to contend with as she battles with a drunken, useless mother, and in a duplicitous act of betrayal, tries to make money from Francesca's miracle workings. For me though, the most interesting character is Anne, Francesca's paleobotanist Mom, who believes fervently in science and in the God of natural selection, "his was a rigged-up junkyard full of life, held together with spit and baling wire." She initially scoffs at Francesca's annunciation and likens it to a drop of water between two slides, like in biology lab, squashed flat so that nobody could move, so that everything could be seen, as if being put under a huge microscope.
Hallowell packs the story with meaning and symbolism, but she does it with a grace and simplicity of voice that is impossible not to like. The narrative does lose some of its impetus towards the end, and the sudden death of one of the major characters doesn't quite work. There is still, however, a certain dramatic tension that permeates the entire novel that should keep the reader involved until the end. I like the questions that Hallowell raises on the uses of medicine and how prescribing medication to prevent the creative forces of visionaries, mystics and martyrs would prevent more suffering, but at the same time, would produce a world without the creativity of saints and madman, because "someone has to walk on the outer edges, Someone has to stir things up." Mike Leonard April 04.
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