Hesse Phillips recommends
Canticle (2025)
Janet Rich Edwards
"Written with luminous simplicity and precision, Canticle is both a coming-of-age novel and a meditation on the limits of spiritual understanding, making for a deeply human hagiography. Even as she ascends towards sainthood and martyrdom, Aleys never feels abstract or inaccessible as a protagonist. As the world around her turns on the whims of a church willing to kill to keep its beleaguered flock in ignorance, her desire for perfect union with God - in both a sensual and spiritual sense - feels vital and revolutionary. With its cast of powerful, independent women living in the margins, its vibrant merchant halls, teeming canals, and backstabbing church politics, Canticle brings a much-misunderstood era to vivid life. I'm excited to see what Janet Rich Edwards does next."
