Rating: 
Summary: Horsley's powerful and poetic "Pagan."
Review: "I am old today," Kate Horsley's 6th century Irish nun Gwynneve writes, chained in her stone cell at the monastery of Saint Brigit. "And I am just born. I am a bird, or a fox, or a bowl, or a knife . . . I can tell you that I have flown this night and seen the face of God and that it looked like the moon almost full. I can tell you that I have grown small as a piece of grain and fell through a tiny hole in a sieve and that a mouse will eat me soon" (p. 169). In the "Translator's Note" to her historical novel, Horsley tells us that Gwynneve's writings were discovered among other AD 500 artifacts in a well "used to hold human remains, agricultural offerings, and other religious items" (p. xi) near Kildare, Ireland. Transcribing the "scriptures, prayers, letters, and truths" (p. 169) of Augustine and Patrick, while also recording the memories of her Pagan youth, Gwynneve finds a "kinship" between Christian and pagan, "between stone chapel and stone circle. One encloses and protects the spirit; the other exposes it and joins it with the elements. In both of these places we conjure the powers that affect and transcend us. We remind ourselves, in both places, that we need oats and milk, but we also need what we cannot see or put in our food bowls" (p. 22). Gwynneve's writings illuminate her life in the Dark Ages, and reveal the love she felt for her druid teacher, Giannon. Horsley's novel is powerful and poetic, filled with passages that will remained in my thoughts long after the book's final page. "I do not understand a man who does not want to know all that he can know," her wise protagonist reflects. "Why would anyone choose ignorance? If he chooses ignorance because he is lazy, then he is a fool, for the ignorant are put to hard labor digging and hauling stones for masters who tell them they need no knowledge. If a man must labor from dawn to dusk to avoid a blow on the head and to earn a cup of grain, he has no time to gain knowledge and remains a slave to masters. I think, therefore, that it is a worthy vocation to free a man enough that he can learn what he is and what he is capable of, where he came from and what philosophies steer his life" (p. 104). Trying to understand Jesus, she writes "I saw one night the eyes of Our Lord as they looked when He was bolted to the tree. His eyes were weary but made of compassion. I smelled his sweat and tasted the blood that fell down His face from the thorns. And He smiled at me, as though we shared an understanding that time passed and that one legend took the place of another as one chiefton dies and another slips onto his seat of power and marries the land" (p. 161). Horsley triumphs at creating a character so real in Gwynneve that it is hard to believe she is just a work of fiction. This compelling novel haunted me for days. G. Merritt
Rating: 
Summary: Amazing
Review: A beautifully written story. So well written the character very quickly became apart of me. I intimately came to know her and melded with her as her thoughts became my thoughts and we walked through her life experiences. I felt sympathy for her, envied her, and cried for her. An Amazing story in a small package. I truly recommend this for reading.
Rating:
Summary: Druid contemplations
Review: Confessions of a Pagan Nun at first struck me as a sort of Gothic Romance title. Nothing could be further from the truth. A speed reader by nature, I found myself savoring words and phrases, going back and re-reading sections. As a former member of a Celtic Reconstructionist Druid Grove, I found myself appreciating Horsleys understanding of the ancient ways so few know of nowadays. She has seriously studied the people of Ireland and the beliefs at the time as well as the ways in which one religion overruns another. Horsley's triumph is weaving these people, their joys, fears, sorrows, and triumphs into a tapesty of words that bring us fully into those times from the comfort of our own homes. Anyone who spends a few hours living Gwenneve's life from early years to its final moments will be enlightened as to just how Christianity came to its place of dominance in the world and will have a fuller appreciation of what our ancestors went through. May the fires of Gwenneve's beloved Brighid always burn.
Rating:
Summary: absolutely wonderful
Review: Confessions of a Pagan Nun is a thought-provoking and breath-taking book. Horsley's style is poetic and simple and both her story and her characters are engaging. She masterfully recreates a time when Paganism was the predominant religion and Christianity was struggling to gain acceptance.
Gwynneve, the narrator of the story, is a nun living in a monastery of Saint Brigit in Ireland during the sixth century. Along side her work transcribing the writings of Saint Patrick and Saint Augustine, Gwynneve tells the story of her Pagan childhood and her life in the monastery, where events are beginning to unfold that threaten Gwynneve and force her to define her beliefs.
The language of the novel is beautiful and filled with rich imagery. When recounting the death of her mother, Gwynneve says "Soon my mother began to shed blood through her mouth. Death was surely just outside our door, drawn by the smell of her blood."
The first-person narrative creates intimacy between Gwynneve and the reader, as Gwynneve discusses the power struggle between the Old Religion and the new. "Rather than seeing a contest between druid and Christian, I see a kinship between stone chapel and stone circle. One encloses and protects the spirit; the other exposes it and joins it with the elements." She goes on to address what she believes is an illogical desire of Christianity to denounce other religions. "Even now I do not understand a jealous God, for if He made all things, than any form of worship that protects His creations and is not destructive or cruel to them must please Him."
Gwynneve also recounts how the Christians stole and reshaped Pagan rituals and places of worship. "Now they make the ancient wells and standing stones into Christian relics, attributing their power to saints," says Gwynneve. "I do not quarrel with this practice, for I believe that which is sacred does not care by what name it is called. But I often wish that I did not know history so well so that I could believe in the Christian rendition of our landscape. Knowledge often spoils devotion."
Horsley's novel is a splendid mix of fiction, philosophy and history. Confessions is an enjoyable and an enlightening read.
Rating:
Summary: A Melancholy Tale
Review: Gwynneve's tale is rather melancholy. She is an nun in sixth century Ireland and she writes of her present as a scribal nun in service of Saint Brigit at Kildare and her strange journey through life from when she was a young pagan girl to her apprenticeship with an angry young druid to how she cam to be in the monastery. Even though it is rather sad, it is also absorbing and has the ring of truth although it is fiction. Here is a vision of a people and land in change. The Irish words interfere in the story and yet they too also enlighten. Just don't read this story if you're morose. It won't make you any happier.
Rating:
Summary: Unexpected Pleasure
Review: I began the story of Gwynneve with little expectation of what the story may hold. I honestly picked it up at the book store because I have been to Ireland and the photo of the clochan caught my eye. I was thrilled to find the story quite captivating. Although the first couple of pages didn't thrill me, I am delighted that I pressed on. The author writes in a simple style, however, the simplicity of the language holds the beauty of the story. In her simple, small view of the world around her, Gwynneve recites the story of her simple life...a woman raised pagen...trained as a druid and scribe..."converted" to a Christianity. She experiences life and death, love and loss, and stuggles as the world around her changes. The end of the story is so moving, I actually read the last paragraph twice. I was outraged and saddened. Then I sat back and contemplated who were the truly God-less ones in her tale...the pagans or the Christians???
Rating:
Summary: Unexpected Pleasure
Review: I began the story of Gwynneve with little expectation of what the story may hold. I honestly picked it up at the book store because I have been to Ireland and the photo of the clochan caught my eye. I was thrilled to find the story quite captivating. Although the first couple of pages didn't thrill me, I am delighted that I pressed on. The author writes in a simple style, however, the simplicity of the language holds the beauty of the story. In her simple, small view of the world around her, Gwynneve recites the story of her simple life...a woman raised pagen...trained as a druid and scribe..."converted" to a Christianity. She experiences life and death, love and loss, and stuggles as the world around her changes. The end of the story is so moving, I actually read the last paragraph twice. I was outraged and saddened. Then I sat back and contemplated who were the truly God-less ones in her tale...the pagans or the Christians???
Rating:
Summary: One of the rare literary gifts
Review: I bought this book because I was intrigued by the title and premise. Little did I expect such a powerful tale and history lesson packed into so small a novel. Like many Irish Americans, I try to reach back through the mists of time to touch upon life in ancient Ireland. Most books give a slight glimpse, this book utterly transported me back in time. We hear of the Island of Saints and Scholars and how Christianity came to Ireland. This is a much different and more realistic picture of what it was really like. It was not the gentle winning over of pagan Druids but a titanic struggle between two very different worlds with the outcome changing things forever. The character, Gwynneve, is caught between the two worlds with a dramatic result. The reader cannot help but imagine living at that time and through those events and feeling the same sweeping forces. For me this book was a mystical experience.
Rating:
Summary: Nothing Short of Amazing
Review: I bought this book because I was intrigued by the title and premise. Little did I expect such a powerful tale and history lesson packed into so small a novel. Like many Irish Americans, I try to reach back through the mists of time to touch upon life in ancient Ireland. Most books give a slight glimpse, this book utterly transported me back in time. We hear of the Island of Saints and Scholars and how Christianity came to Ireland. This is a much different and more realistic picture of what it was really like. It was not the gentle winning over of pagan Druids but a titanic struggle between two very different worlds with the outcome changing things forever. The character, Gwynneve, is caught between the two worlds with a dramatic result. The reader cannot help but imagine living at that time and through those events and feeling the same sweeping forces. For me this book was a mystical experience.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting, but ...
Review: I enjoyed this short book for the unique voice it adds to the literature on the time period. However, it disappointed me in the end. The prose, peppered with awkward metaphors and unnecessary Gaelic vocabulary, did not achieve its intended effect of immersing me into the setting. Rather, it distracted me with its talk of "the time of light green leaves" and sentences like this: "I will advise Sister Ailenn to ... take some tanag from the im noin to keep in her clochan ..." Tanag is cheese. Im noin is a meal. A clochan is a beehive cell. Horsley tells us in her playful preface that she preserves Gaelic vocabulary where no English words can capture their meaning. One wonders if she is instead having irresponsible fun with a Gaelic dictionary. (And that preface, which asks us to believe that what follows is a translation of actual writings from a medieval nun, is an authorial intrusion that reminds us exactly who is to blame for the excessive prose.) More importantly, and damning from my point of view--I found these metaphors and vocabulary contributing to a narrative voice bordering on the sappy New Age drivel that all-too-often ruins serious investigation of this time and place. I suspect, and hope, that this was not Horsley's goal. This is the first time I've read her, though. For that serious investigation, I'd recommend Geoffrey Moorhouse's SUN DANCING (another fictional imagining) or Cahill's HOW THE IRISH SAVED CIVILIZATION (not fiction--a very nationalistic but still admirable scholarly treatment). Or, go to some of the primary sources: THE LIFE OF ST. COLUMBA, etc. Then come back to CONFESSIONS. You'll be in a better mind to take what is valuable, and discard the rest. What's valuable? CONFESSIONS is an admirable attempt at portraying the women of this period. Moorehouse, Adomnan of Iona, etc., haven't written much about them. Horsley gets three stars for giving us a character who conveys the conflicts of her times from a believable female point of view. She'd have gotten five if she'd written it like Moorhouse.
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