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Elizabeth Cunningham

Daughter of the Shining Isles (The Magdalen Trilogy, Vol. 1) Hardcover – June 1, 2000

by Elizabeth Cunningham (Author)

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With keen psychological insight and disarming humor, Elizabeth Cunningham re-imagines the beginnings of Christianity from a Celtic point-of-view. Her Celtic Magdalen invites us to wonder how a woman trained in the mysteries of Druidism and ancient Celtic spirituality might have fallen under the spell of the young Jesus of Nazareth and cast her own magic over him. The evolving tale of love, challenge, and triumph will captivate readers seeking fresh perspectives into the Celtic and Christian elements of our Western spiritual heritage.-Tom Cowan, author of Fire in the Head, Shamanism and the Celtic Spirit

"Cunningham wears her reverence at a such a rakish angle that it's easy to overlook the deeply religious sensibility that informs her work. In treating the pious and priggish denial of Christ's physicality as the set-up for her outlandish comic effects, she is fall-out-of-your-chair funny. She could crack up the Mater Dolorosa. But she is also mounting a serious challenge to that denial. Nor does she spare the more recent pieties of New Age spirituality, which tend to bury the personality of Magdalen under a mawkish heap of female archetypes. Her mouthy Magdalen won't sit still for being anyone's icon or emblem. She is here to tell you that Jesus, her friend, sweetheart and "cosmic sibling rival" was adorably, poignantly--and sometimes annoyingly--human. In less grace-full hands, this sassy treatment might amount to no more than a smart-aleck deconstruction of Christ's divinity. But Cunningham is up to no such thing. She insists on humanity as one who sees in its every awkward aspect the image and likeness of God. Beneath her sense of the ridiculous and the ribald, is a subtext that sings "Alleluia!" -Catherine MacCoun, author of The Age of Miracles

"Cunningham has outdone herself. Always an imaginative writer, as such books as The Return of the Goddess and The Wild Mother show, Cunningham here mixes Celtic mythology with the emergent feminist tradition of the Magdalen to create a powerful and spiritually charged visionary novel. Red-haired Maeve was born on the legendary Isle of Women, where her weather-witching mothers (yes, the plural is intentional) raise her to be utterly self-assured as

Print length

416 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Station Hill Press
Publication date

June 1, 2000
Dimensions

6.33 x 1.36 x 9.24 inches
ISBN-10

158177060X
ISBN-13

978-1581770605
See all details

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

According to the publicity material accompanying her new book, novelist Cunningham (The Return of the Goddess) is descended from nine generations of Episcopal priests. She resisted the temptation to become a Christian priest herself, but proudly calls herself a priestess, and has written reams of feminist, neo-pagan fiction. In this novel, the first in a projected trilogy, Cunningham introduces us to Mary Magdalen, Celtic-style. Here, Mary, called Maeve, is born in the Land of Women in 4 B.C.E. As a young woman, she moves to Mona to study at a druidic university. There she meets EsusAaka JesusAwho is also studying there during his so-called lost years. In Maeve, Cunningham has blended the perky insouciance of Sabrina the teenage witch with the penetrating common sense of Jane Austen's Elizabeth Bennett. She speaks in a refreshingly modern voiceA"Yes, I know. Girl hero is awkward, like woman doctor.... But I balk at the word heroine. A personal quirk." But awkward locutions creep into this historical fantasy ("It was the blood, my woman's blood!"), and much of the novel reads like a poor imitation of Ursula Le Guin. At times, Cunningham tries too hard to prove her bona fides; her references to the Talmud, for example, hardly blend in seamlessly. ("You'll find this very discussion in a volume called Taharoth, in the tractate Niddah, chapter 9, Mishnah 5.") The endearing protagonist almost makes plowing through the tendentious, turgid prose worthwhile. Almost, but not quite. (June)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Cunningham outdoes herself. Always an imaginative writer, as The Return of the Goddess (1992) and The Wild Mother (1993) attest, Cunningham now mixes Celtic mythology with the emergent feminist tradition of the Magdalen to create a powerful, spiritually charged visionary novel. Red-haired Maeve was born on the legendary Isle of Women, where her weather-witching mothers (the plural is intentional) raise her to be utterly self-assured as well as almost overwhelmingly self-willed. But her confidence and skills are put to the test when, accepted as one of the first female candidates for initiation at Mona, she meets her soulmate and beloved, Esus (aka Jesus) of Nazareth, whose lengthy, invisible apprenticeship wasn't among the Essenes, as some would have it, but among the Druids, where he learned his destiny in a shamanic vision. In less-skilled hands, this wild combination of cultures and spiritual traditions might strain all suspension of disbelief, but Cunningham makes Maeve a force of nature that sweeps the reader along in her train. Indeed, Cunningham's artistry encourages the belief that, if there had been a lover fated for the fated savior, she certainly would have been this brilliant, soulful, sensual Celtic lass, Maeve. And this is just the first volume of a projected trilogy. Patricia Monaghan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product details

Publisher : Station Hill Press; 0 edition (June 1, 2000)
Language : English
Hardcover : 416 pages
ISBN-10 : 158177060X
ISBN-13 : 978-1581770605
Item Weight : 2.1 pounds
Dimensions : 6.33 x 1.36 x 9.24 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #3,023,225 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #13,926 in Historical Fantasy (Books)
- #633,588 in Religion & Spirituality (Books)

Customer Reviews:
20 ratings

Customer reviews

5 star		47%
4 star		10%
3 star		23%
2 star		10%
1 star		10%

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Top reviews from the United States

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Angelique Rosario

Fantastic book

Reviewed in the United States on November 23, 2019

Verified Purchase

Fantastic book!

Helpful

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on May 3, 2015

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Love her novels!

Helpful

Judith Bobbitt

Daughter of the Shining Isles

Reviewed in the United States on June 16, 2014

Verified Purchase

The water damage on the book was not limited to just the back book cover. Water damage and signs of mold were also evident 8 pages from the back cover. Even tho the pages are wrinkled from being wet at some time, the main pages of the text are readable. At least I am able to read the book and content is what I was wanting. It would have been nice to keep the collection, but I will not keep this one after I have read it.

Helpful

Jean Bakula

and seeing these two become "the lovers of the World" is a wonderful thing. I have read the Bible

Reviewed in the United States on April 17, 2018

As a Pagan, I simply adored the Maeve Chronicles. It became 4 books in the end, and I have read them all twice now! The idea of Maeve and Esus, attending Druid School, (Esus being Jesus of Nazareth in his "lost years") is both hilarious and romantic. We know Christianity found it's way to Ireland, and I can actually believe this is the truth when I read this again (which I will). You are in for a treat! Jesus has all the human traits as any male, and seeing these two become "the lovers of the World" is a wonderful thing. I have read the Bible, but loved this a lot more!

I don't know why people are upset about a little menstrual blood. Like any young guy, Jesus doesn't know a whole lot about how a women's body works, but becomes interested. Maeve's ability to speak Aramaic is helpful to him--as it was meant to be. Have fun with this one.

Helpful

Kelly (Fantasy Literature)

"But did you know that the star had a twin?"

Reviewed in the United States on July 15, 2001

I liked this book most of the time I was reading it. I still go back and reread parts of it. There are other parts I never reread.
Why I liked this book: First, it's hilarious at times. Unlike another reviewer, I loved the Q-Celtic rap; it was a very funny modernization of the very real insult wars Celtic women had with one another. In another writer's hands, the scene might have been too archaic in tone to really express the humor and sarcasm the women used. I loved Bran's self-introduction. I loved the scene where Esus takes the Druid "entrance exam." The beginning of the book is a laugh riot, for the most part. Toward the middle and end, it took on a more serious tone, and it is a testament to the author's skill that the two "moods" did not clash; the book flowed naturally from comedy to drama. I don't want to spoil the plot for anyone, but the heroic plot cooked up by Maeve and Dwynwyn is worth the price of the book all by itself. The courage and cleverness the women show is my _other_ favorite aspect of _Daughter of the Shining Isles_. This is the story of a young girl growing into a powerful and strong woman, and what a fascinating story it is!
What I didn't like: I thought the urination and menstruation jokes were excessive. Not that there's anything wrong with bodily functions--we all have them--but we're talking overkill here.

8 people found this helpful

Helpful

Lesa

Bawdy, but entertaining

Reviewed in the United States on August 8, 2003

This is the Magdalene.org review: "Daughter of the Shining Isles" is the first part of an ambitious trilogy by Elizabeth Cunningham. She takes us to the Celtic-speaking world of 9 C.E. where the main character, Maeve Rhaud, is born and raised by eight weather-warrior witches on the island of Tir na mBam. There, she has a startling vision of her cosmic twin, Esus, in a back alley of Jerusalem: he is relieving his bladder.
If this is a startling image for you, then you should avoid the book. Cunningham's Maeve Rhaud is a headstrong, earthy character with no qualms about speaking of bodily functions, and she does so with great frequency. They are, in fact, important plot points in the story. This was a great drawback for me when I first started the book, and it wasn't until I was halfway through it that I decided the story was entertaining enough to compensate for Cunningham's Celtic witches' apparent scatalogical fascination.
A majority of the story takes place at the legendary Druid college of Mona, where Maeve Rhaud undertakes bardic training. The author accounts for the "lost years" of Jesus (Esus) by placing him in the college with her. He has a difficult time believing that his cosmic twin is someone so "unclean," and they have frequent theological arguments about monotheism versus her polytheistic ways. Maeve is constantly in trouble with the faculty of the college, clashing with personalities and breaking taboos. It is in this setting that she falls in love with the 15 year old man from Jerusalem and pledges her life to him.
Cunningham's novel is narrated by Maeve, who uses modern metaphors to describe the events in her tale. In spite of this chronological inconsistency, the story is extremely entertaining and told with good humor. It moves along quickly, and the main characters are well developed. If you are familiar with biblical accounts of the life of Jesus, you will be amused by the references to how his legend was shaped by people after his death.
If you're able to laugh at bawdy humor and don't have an easily tweaked sense of the blasphemous, this book will leave you satisfied and waiting eagerly for the next novel in the series.

12 people found this helpful

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Amazon Customer

Excellent start!

Reviewed in the United States on January 8, 2005

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. I don't usually enjoy first-person fictional accounts; however, this was an exception. There are a couple of reasons why I didn't give it five stars, however:

1. The protagonist occasionally wanders off on tangents in the middle of some of the premier events during the story. I do expect some tangents, especially when a book is written from a first-person POV; however, it seems like these could be a bit shorter to make the story more powerful.

2. The menstrual blood thing was kind of...strange. It didn't bother me the first time, and it at no point disgusted me, but I thought that the differences between the protagonist and the way other women were brought up were quite marked without the incident with the menstrual blood while she was at the druid college.

In all, I loved the story and am very much looking forward to reading the next one in the trilogy.

Helpful

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Daughter of the Shining Isles (The Magdalen Trilogy, Vol. 1) Hardcover – June 1, 2000

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