The anchoress / Robyn Cadwallader.
Material type:
TextPublisher: New York : Sarah Crichton Books/Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2015Edition: First editionDescription: 310 pages ; 22 cmContent type: - text
- unmediated
- volume
- 0374104255 (cloth)
- 9780374104252 (cloth)
| Item type | Home library | Collection | Call number | Materials specified | Status | Date due | Barcode | Item holds | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Adult Book
|
Main Library | Fiction | Cadwalla Robyn | Available | 33111008009918 |
Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:
England, 1255 . What could drive a girl on the cusp of womanhood to lock herself away from the world forever?
Sarah is just seventeen when she chooses to become an anchoress, a holy woman shut away in a cell that measures only seven by nine paces, at the side of the village church. Fleeing the grief of losing a much-loved sister in childbirth as well as pressure to marry the local lord's son, she decides to renounce the world--with all its dangers, desires, and temptations--and commit herself to a life of prayer.
But it soon becomes clear that the thick, unforgiving walls of Sarah's cell cannot protect her as well as she had thought. With the outside world clamoring to get in and the intensity of her isolation driving her toward drastic actions, even madness, her body and soul are still in grave danger. When she starts hearing the voice of the previous anchoress whispering to her from the walls, Sarah finds herself questioning what she thought she knew about the anchorhold, and about the village itself.
With the lyricism of Nicola Griffith's Hild and the vivid historical setting of Hannah Kent's Burial Rites , Robyn Cadwallader's powerful debut novel tells an absorbing story of faith, desire, shame, fear, and the very human need for connection and touch. Compelling, evocative, and haunting, The Anchoress is both quietly heartbreaking and thrillingly unpredictable.
"A debut novel, set in 1255, about a young woman who chooses to become an anchoress, which means shutting herself away in a small cell by the side of the village church for the rest of her life and devoting herself to prayer"-- Provided by publisher.
"A startling and strange debut novel about a young girl's desperate choice to isolate herself from the world England, 1255: Sarah is only seventeen when she chooses to become an anchoress, a holy woman much like Saint Hildegard of Bingen, shut away in a small cell, measuring seven by nine paces, at the side of the village church. Fleeing the grief of losing a much-loved sister in childbirth and the pressure to marry, she decides to renounce the world, with all its dangers, desires, and temptations, and to commit herself to a life of prayer. But it soon becomes clear that even the thick, unforgiving walls of her cell cannot keep the outside world away, and Sarah's body and soul are still in great danger. Robyn Cadwallader's powerful debut novel tells an absorbing, entirely human, and compulsively readable story of faith, desire, shame, fear, and the very human need for connection and touch. Compelling, evocative, and haunting, The Anchoress is both quietly heartbreaking and thrillingly unpredictable"-- Provided by publisher.