Susan Fish

Summary: Approaching fifty, Elizabeth Fane suddenly leaves work she loves as an executive director of a non-profit and a family that has been her life to work in the gardens of a convent in Florence, Italy.

Elizabeth Fane came across these words in a book of Dante, found in a church rummage sale:

“Midway on life’s journey I found myself alone in a dark wood where the right way was lost.”

Little did Liz realize that within a few months, she would be living these words. She was approaching fifty with a husband she loved and three grown up sons leaving home. She served as executive director of a non-profit, a job she loved and was good at. Then came the day an associate mentions something about her family that rocks her world because it was something she didn’t know.

She steps away from her work and makes plans to go to Italy, leaving family behind. She goes, not as a tourist but a garden volunteer at a convent in Florence, Italy. Florence, the heart of the Renaissance. Dante’s house. The Accademia and the Uffizi. The works of Caravaggio, da Vinci, and Michelangelo. Ancient churches, bustling markets, a glorious countryside.

Yet her life seems a dark wood. But she slowly opens up to the good food, the prayers in a grotto, conversations with Honey and Cecy and a painting of Mary, alone, that Cecy nicknames Our Lady of Perpetual Constipation. She works with the convent gardener who teaches her the work of pruning olive trees. He begins each day drinking a cup of olive oil, giving thanks both to God and the olive grove. Mornings are spent pruning, afternoons by gathering pruned branches. But what is being pruned in Liz?

Through most of the story, she keeps her secret to herself, only sharing it late in the story with Honey, who sees things differently than she. A subsequent betrayal by an old high school friend she encountered on a tour forces her to example how the secret kept from her by her husband and son affected her–not only how they saw her, but also the identity that she had constructed.

There is that painting of Mary, that hangs in her room. Not Mary with child. Not the Pieta, Mary holding her dead son. Mary alone. Mary who has said “let it be unto me…” and Mary whose own heart has been pierced with a sword. Was Mary still saying “let it be unto me”? Could Liz? What would that mean for how she saw her husband? Her son? Herself?

Susan Fish tells the story of a woman seeking her own renaissance, trying to find her way through a dark would where all the familiar trail blazes are missing. Liz’s search is juxtaposed with the beauties of Florence and it’s countryside. Yet her healing comes not from the beauties of the place but as she comes to a place of vulnerable, raw honesty, facing her anger that kept her from going to the English church, and the false self she projected to family and even herself. A profound story of a mid-life renaissance.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.… (meer)

3.5 Stars

This is the story of Melchior, a man who's story starts in his childhood in a poor town as a rug-maker, with his family, and the trials that bring adulthood, his destined profession as a magi, and his Faith. It tells the story of the birth in Bethlemhem, through the eyes of one of the "Three Wise Men".

This is a simple story that only took me two hours to finish, but it held my attention the entire time. Although it is definitely a work of fiction, it was a loving tale, and with the exception of a few ill-fitting statements, one seemingly forced/unnatural conversation between Melchior and Reta, and a jump in time that was not adequately transitioned (but was made up for with the story that followed), I greatly enjoyed the voice of the main character, and narrator, Melchior, and the way that he spoke. The characters were really well done for such a short book, and there were some really honest and touching lines that I loved. I probably wouldn't buy this to read again, but I like the way it feels in the air after it has ended.… (meer)