Customer Reviews

Little Saint

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Do you like to visit foreign lands without having to take the time and expense of actually traveling there? Well, this book is a marvelous example of actually visiting the small village of Conques in south France. We get to meet people and places, hear tales and myths, and share a little bit in the author's own feelings and spiritual experiences at a saint's shrine. This is a good read, but not very exciting. Very true to life.

Well - - - this was a little difficult to get through. However, if you have any religous fervor in the slightest, go for it. Also, if you have any knowledge of Conques or the Aveyron region of France, this is for you. She details a lot about this area and you can easily feel yourself in that world. Sometimes I felt as though I were back there. Personally though, I liked her "The Dead of the House" better, but it was completely different.

If you have scored highly on 'South of France' travel narratives and combined Church history reading...if only trivia, hold on your in for a very fascinating ride. Frances Mays takes us to Tuscany and Peter Mayle covered Provence very few in print have covered this mid-pyrenee region and legend. Hannah Green will appeal to a larger host of audience. Why? Due to the wide spectrum of topics and appeal. First the travel buff, then the South of France fans, then the religious folks and not to mention the purely intellectual group who will want to experience a widely unknown 'Saint and Section' of France. My particular interest was all of the above and a recent pilgrimage I took. This book sets one off to study to the wide eye fascination with 'wonder, childlike faith and desparate adult petitions to the vastly hidden Sainte Foy'. It intriqued me that once again (i.e. Kathleen Norris) a non Catholic is making a journey into many avenues your basic educated Catholic has not traversed let only published. That comment equals the four stars I rated this book. Enjoy the ride.

If you already have an intense interest in St. Foy, or in the Aveyron region of France, you will enjoy this book. It contains some beautifully written passages and warm, honest sentiment.
It also contains a lot of minutely detailed descriptions of places, people, encounters, artistic impressions, religious experiences, scholarly and historical research, cultural observations... What it does not contain is any narrative momentum. All the lovely writing is strung together without any context. Who is this woman who went to all the trouble to document her experiences in Conques over the years? The reader is left with very little idea. After a while, you'll just want it to stop.

This book is first an account of a religious awakening, which occurs when the author, interested in this little traveled part of France and its patron saint, experiences something mystical and mysterious. As a basically non-religious person, however, I found her description quite opaque. (The author also has the annoying habit of writing very, very long sentences.) I thought this book worked a lot better as one of the "Year in Provence/Bella Tuscany" genre--particularly because it is focused much more on the people and culture, and not on a home improvement project. The author's own nationality and culture are very much in the background, and there is not an ounce of condescension in her descriptions. Interestingly, this book was published posthumously: the author died in 1996, and I have a sense that the book, which is set in the late 1970's, may have been written much earlier than others in its more well-known travel genre category. For a much more accessible, beautifully written account of religious experience and community, try a slim, simple novella called "Lying Awake" by Salzman.