Rating: 
Summary: Wasn't sure I would like the book, yet it held my interest.
Review: I particularly enjoyed reading the sections that looked back at how and why women joined the Order. It was a nice historical touch. I was also very glad that the author could write positively about women as nuns. That doesn't always happen.
Rating:
Summary: Even the title is misleading; focus is on the author herself
Review: I was almost through the book when I realized the author really thought she was writing about calling (newfangled version of "vocation") in a general way. She or her editor just didn't get it done. Little cries about a "different" sort of book - just go where it leads you, etc., can't defend jumping around from anecdote to anecdote and then measuring EVERYTHING by herself and her shutdown life. All that glory and all she can do is go over and over how she was "rejected." I really enjoyed the stories of the nuns, though. Staying or leaving, they gave us glimpses of women of depth and wonder. I've never been a Roman Catholic but I'm a Christian. I'm glad I read this and in the words of people lots younger than old me, the author needs to "get a life."
Rating:
Summary: Even the title is misleading; focus is on the author herself
Review: I was almost through the book when I realized the author really thought she was writing about calling (newfangled version of "vocation") in a general way. She or her editor just didn't get it done. Little cries about a "different" sort of book - just go where it leads you, etc., can't defend jumping around from anecdote to anecdote and then measuring EVERYTHING by herself and her shutdown life. All that glory and all she can do is go over and over how she was "rejected." I really enjoyed the stories of the nuns, though. Staying or leaving, they gave us glimpses of women of depth and wonder. I've never been a Roman Catholic but I'm a Christian. I'm glad I read this and in the words of people lots younger than old me, the author needs to "get a life."
Rating: 
Summary: What are the nuns doing now? A look at nuns today.
Review: I was captivated with the book because of the story lovingly told of the lives of the nuns today, told against the author's own quest for meaning. Vignettes of the Sisters are used to show the changes in the lives of the nuns after the Vatican 11 Council which called for renewal in all areas of the nuns lives. Despite being part fiction and part non-fiction, the author manages to capture the authentic spirit of the nuns today. Even after 2 reads, I am beginning to read the book again. There are so many pearls of description, vignettes of personalities, and witticisms that are not caught on a first read.
Rating:
Summary: Awkward mish-mash
Review: If you are expecting this book to tell what motivates sisters, what they do, and how they have adapted in the post Vatican II world I would suggest you read Poverty Chastity & Change by Carole Garibaldi Rogers instead. I find this book by Catherine Whitney awkwardly arranged and the content "lite" - a mish-mash of memoir and local history.
Rating: 
Summary: Whence the subtitle?
Review: If you are expecting to be drawn into the liturgical rhythm, discipline and complex beauty of religious life, this book will disappoint. It is not, as its subtitle implies, an ethographic description of life behind convent walls. It is, instead, a telling of the personal and spiritual journeys taken by a cross-section of women. Most of these women were at some point "Called" and spent at least part of their lives in the convent at Rosary Heights. But others, including the author, are more loosely connected to the religious life. The fascination of this book, and it is fascinating, lies in the diversity of the women themselves and in the author's ability to set their thoughts and actions firmly in the cultural milieu in which they take place.The author presents each woman's story with great respect and affection, and as you read, you too will come to appreciate those who have heard and responded to "The Call." Many books of this genre leave us feeling that to succeed in the religious life one must be or become meek, subservient and narrow. They led us to believe that the convent is not a place for the stong, the independent and the courageous. This book provides a broader perspective. Perhaps many a true feminist finds her freedom and nutures her strength within the convent walls.
Rating:
Summary: As an ex-nun, I found The Calling right on target
Review: In the mid-1960s, I was a member of the order of the Sisters of the Sacred Heart. Catherine Whitney's book brought back many memories of that time. I appreciated the way she dealt with even the negative parts in a non-judgmental way. Her own journey, which she brought so movingly to life, reminds me of my own struggles for faith, and my desire, even when I had left the order, to do something important with my "calling." This book will remain in my heart and on my coffee table.
Rating: 
Summary: The anti-establishment generation returns to its roots.
Review: Like many people of my genration, I dropped out of the Catholic Church in the late 1960s. Thirty years later, I returned to see the nuns who taught me, and I was surprisingly moved by their dedication and courage.
Rating: 
Summary: Title v. Rambling Content
Review: The book rambles a lot. The subject inside has nothing to do with the title. I was pulled in by false advertizing on that alone. I felt like I was invited to an old country estate and left outside to look in the windows. The interesting vignettes are far and few between, and the reader never really gets to know the characters well. I don't know the author, presumably who is the center point of the book. There are better books that discuss the decline in religious life, or chronicle individuals who have lived out their vocations. Perhaps "The Calling" will be a better read for someone else.
Rating:
Summary: Title v. Rambling Content
Review: The overall sense I received from this work is that Catherine Whitney is more interested in speaking of herself (without so much as answering the question of why she suddenly shifted from would-be religious Sister to unbelieving radical feminist). The anecdotal information about several Sisters in the earlier chapters seems a promise of real development later, but this promise remains unfulfilled. Half stories, some of which seem flavoured by stereotypes and prejudiced assumptions, are profoundly unsatisfying, particularly since the natural presumption to which the early chapters would lead was that depth, development, and understanding of the various Sisters' situations would follow. It did not happen. There is a sampling of moments from various Sisters' lives (not, as the sub-title implies, a chronicle of a year in the life of an Order), but no insight into anything.
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