2014 Audie Award Finalist for Audiobook of the Year, Literary Fiction,
and Solo Narration--Female!
"Tóibín is at his lyrical best in this beautiful and daring work"
(The New York Times Book Review) that portrays Mary as a solitary
older woman still seeking to understand the events that become the
narrative of the New Testament and the foundation of
Christianity--shortlisted for the 2013 Man Booker Prize.
In the ancient town of Ephesus, Mary lives alone, years after her son's
crucifixion. She has no interest in collaborating with the authors of
the Gospel, who are her keepers. She does not agree that her son is the
Son of God; nor that his death was "worth it"; nor that the "group of
misfits he gathered around him, men who could not look a woman in the
eye," were holy disciples.
Mary judges herself ruthlessly (she did not stay at the foot of the
cross until her son died--she fled, to save herself), and her judgment
of others is equally harsh. This woman whom we know from centuries of
paintings and scripture as the docile, loving, silent, long-suffering,
obedient, worshipful mother of Christ becomes a tragic heroine with the
relentless eloquence of Electra or Medea or Antigone. Tóibín's tour de
force of imagination and language is a portrait so vivid and convincing
that our image of Mary will be forever transformed.
