She lies in her darkened cell, alone, cold, hungry and exhausted, awaiting the tortures of the Re-Education Facility. The Regimen Custodia Terra have Liberty 554-062466-84 of Aldonia, exactly where she wants to be. Something of a MacGyver, Liberty becomes more dangerous in captivity than on the loose—always improvising, planning and […]
Stay With Me, by Carolyn Astfalk
Shopping for yogurt can change your life, especially when it brings together two strikingly attractive twenty-somethings. Chris immediately responds to Rebecca, setting up a first date. Could this be the result of the alignment of the stars, an inborn response to hormones and pheromones, or God’s using biology to call […]
The Year of the French, by Thomas Flanagan
“Inequality is the root of social evil.” @Pontifex 4:28 AM – 28 Apr 2014 We reel from the impact of violence, persecution, massive migrations and political divisiveness, yet similar tribulations plague humanity over the millennia. History’s lessons unlearned, like demons, repossess the house from which they were driven. If we […]
Yes, a Short Story by Ann McIntyre
During a cold and damp Lent, Yes, a homeless immigrant, barely survives his crossing of the Mediterranean to Italy. Suffering from pneumonia and a multitude of injuries, he finds shelter among Bernini’s colonnade in Vatican City, drawing disdainful stares from Christian tourists and members of the curia. Thanks to the […]
Rosa, Sola, by Carmela Martino
In Rosa, Sola, Carmela Martino extended an invitation for her readers to meet Rosa Bernardi and share the hospitality of her Italian immigrant household. Martino spiced the text with Italian dialogue and painted her chapters in domestic minutiae that placed a fork in the reader’s right hand and a […]
Healer: A Novel, by John M. Wills
Healer reminds me of a Norman Rockwell print. Rockwell could transform the most ordinary, everyday events into the most extraordinary images. He filled his portraits with warm, happy, generous, uplifting people. Hidden among a cohort of typical high school kids, Wills finds the extraordinary, the superhero — the healer. Of […]
A Soldier Surrenders, by Susan Peek
Susan Peek has introduced another of her friends in high places. Camillus de Lellis lived in the sixteenth century, a time of saints and turmoil. Nonetheless, his life and example relate especially well to our times. His résumé included life as a soldier, a veteran, a wounded warrior, a gambler, […]
Down Right Good, by Karen Kelly Boyce
This story of social media with training wheels follows ten-year-old Angie’s Saturday deliveries of newspapers and baked goods. Each customer along Angie’s route receives her gifts and shares conversations, usually revealing vexing problems. Angie gathers problems at each stop, not as burdens but with an intention of finding solutions. Angie’s Down […]
A Bend in the Road: A Year’s Journey through Breast Cancer, by Karen Kelly Boyce
The author reminds us that we all share a terminal condition: life. Sooner or later it will end. A diagnosis of cancer suggests a sooner rather than a later demise. If not fatal, cancer certainly raises the specter of a war within our bodies between an invasive malignancy and the […]
Joy: Meditations on the Joyful Heritage of Christianity, by Louis Evely
“We can understand Lent…we devote ourselves to penance, compassion and mortification, but how lax we are during the days that follow our sorrow. We do not even know how to rejoice…The day is coming when the Spirit of Truth will breathe upon us, and we do not joyfully await […]