Throughout history, I doubt there has ever been a woman who has inspired more devotion than Mary, mother of Jesus of Nazareth... known to Christians as the Messiah, the Son of God. People throughout the world pray to God each day, invoking Mary's name, hoping she will intercede on their behalf so that their prayers might be answered. As a young Roman Catholic girl, I was taught that Mary was the standard bearer for how a Catholic girl should live her life. I was to mold myself using the qualitie...

‘’Because the world is a place of silence, the sky at night when the birds have gone is a vast silent place. No words will make the slightest difference to the sky at night.’’A few years after the events of that nightmarish week, Mary is visited by two men who wish to write about everything that happened. Mary doesn’t want to talk to them or to anyone. They can’t understand. How could they possibly understand what it is to watch your only child dying in unthinkable agony while his tormentors ar

My grandfather was a preacher.I remember him as a kind man who liked to work in his garden but he was also a “fire and brimstone” orator who would deliver Jonathon Edwards like sermons. This was rural Tennessee in the mid 70s and I recall standing in the back of the church with him and stoic men in overalls and stiff jackets shaking his hand and thanking him for “the message.”He liked to ask me what I knew about the Bible and he would quietly sing hymns and tell me stories. My grandmother would

“I remember everything. Memory fills my body as much as blood and bones.”“I remember too much; I am like the air on a calm day as it holds itself still, letting nothing escape.” The Testament of Mary is written simply, with flowing prose and metaphorically rich language that has a hypnotic quality, creating perfectly a silent and dark atmosphere of Biblical times.Both harrowing and ecstatically beautiful, the story of Jesus is told from the completely absorbing perspective of Mary. In The Testam...

This is such a lovely book. A very dear friend of mine is a bit obsessed with Tóibín, madly in love with his writing and really doesn’t think he could ever put a foot wrong. And reading this it is hard not to agree. I found myself reading large parts of this aloud, unable to resist hearing the words – I virtually finished it in one sitting, but fell asleep last night and then read what was left on the train today, a little upset I had to read it to myself. The sentences are so beautifully crafte...

Meryl Streep reads Mary of NazarethMy god this is gorgeous!! If you read this book, you MUST use the audio version. It's a monologue. Streep brings Mary to life as a bitter, realistic mother. This novel was just beautiful on its tragic honesty, giving the reader brutal insight into Mary's thoughts and opinions about the "misfits" and this "son of god" business. I remember years ago reading The Master by this same author and absolutely loving it too. He may be a new go-to writer for me.#96 audio

I read The Testament of Mary before dawn on this Easter Sunday. A coincidence, but not altogether without significance. It is an Easter Sunday direct-dialed from heaven: every color in the dyed-egg basket is reflected in spring’s delicate light - from the cornflower blue sky to the coral-pink sunrise to the daffodils in scene-stealing yellow. It is a day to believe in Resurrection and rebirth. Yet, I am not a Believer in the Christian sense. That Jesus was a real man I have no doubt. That he was...

Perhaps, as someone who was raised in a Catholic household (albeit, by hippies with Catholic backgrounds), I will never fully manage to shake off a certain curiosity about Jesus. Even if I haven’t considered myself a Catholic since I was seven years old (long story, but its apparently when I declared that I would not go to Mass with my grandparents anymore), I still find him interesting, but I much prefer to hear historical or so-called “alternative” narratives about Jesus and his life, whether

I am not a Christian and I do not believe Jesus is the Son of God any more than all of us are somehow connected to the unknowable force of creation. Ok, having said that, The Testament of Mary is a beautifully constructed imagining of a mother’s anguish over the life choices of a son she sees as increasingly confused and pompous, pushed by the agenda of others to go further and further until he becomes a threat that must be eliminated by the powers that be. The description of her son’s crucifixi...

“The Testament of Mary” is a book I was aware of, but had no burning desire to read. When it was picked for my book club I read it, and I am glad that I did. The idea for the story is great. Putting aside the faith based aspect of the Christ story, what would a mother think of her son in the circumstances that surrounded the last three year of Jesus’ life? I believe that Colm Toibin has done a good job at taking a story that is known by most, and making parts of it seem new.First off, the text i...

OK, I'll start with the jokes. A laconic Jewish mother? Let me tell you, if they would have nailed me to a cross when I was about 30 years old, my mom would have had way more than 20K words to say about it. And this book? It's the only part of the "New Testament," with the exception of Revelation, that I've ever read. The Old Testament? I've read that backwards (Hebrew) and forwards (Yinglish), complete with footnotes. Here we get Mary, kvetchy as anything, but also ice cold sane. I'd be kvetchy...

3.5 stars rounded up for the audio version of The Testament of Mary, as narrated by Meryl Streep. This is Mary's story as she tells it. Her thoughts, opinions, and self-doubt all laid bare in a most intimate fashion on the page. There are no words wasted in the telling of this narrative, which results in a book that is very short, but incredibly tightly written. Listening to this book is a very powerful experience -- exactly what one would expect from the wonderful Ms. Streep. She manages to imb...

In this short piece, Tóibín offers readers an insightful look into the life of Jesus Christ, from the perspective of his mother. The story becomes a monologue, delivered by Mary, that weaves throughout the life of her son, though she will never use his name. Mary offers memories from the evolving life of Jesus, adding editorial commentary when it suits her best. Choosing to see the disciples as a collection of vagrants and vagabonds, Mary cannot always understand why Jesus would associate with t...

A book that attempts to humanize a fantastical story, and it's certainly more effective (as a basis for faith) in the form of a fantastical story. What a different book the Bible would have been had it been written, even partly, by Jesus's mother. We embrace and yet at the same time are repelled by the idea that Jesus was just a man. Sure, he performed miracles, but what were his motivations? Is it acceptable that he turned water into wine because he was at a party--a wedding--and there wasn't e...

I don’t spend much of my time reading anything related directly to any sort of organized faith. I picked this one up because of it being on the ‘2013 Man Booker Longlist’. It was also an easy one to knock off the list since it is fairly short. Even with all of that, I’ve read worse than this. It had its problems but made the Jesus story somewhat understandable.It was a very short book. In one way, I liked it. As I said, I’m not a big fan of religious books. So, the fact that it was short was nic...