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Absent a Miracle cover art

Absent a Miracle

By: Christine Lehner
Narrated by: Rachel Fulginiti
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Editor reviews

The titular miracle in this imaginative novel by Christine Lehner refers to one character’s efforts to get a Nicaraguan woman sainted, but hagiography is only one of the places where the miraculous comes into play. Alice, who’s lost her job as a radio-show dream analyst, is at home with a sick dog while her family goes on a spelunking vacation when her husband’s college roommate, who’s on the aforementioned canonical quest, comes to visit. Rachel Fulginiti performs the audiobook delightfully, embodying its protagonist and fashioning a variety of voices New England, Nicaraguan, feminine, and masculine. Sainthood is hard to achieve but so are marriage and dog care. You’ll find the title taking on new meanings as Alice searches for a miracle.

Summary

Alice Fairweather, a lapsed Catholic who lives in upstate New York with her two sons and philandering husband (whom she loves to distraction), has just lost her dream job as a radio talk show hostess. When one of the family dogs suddenly becomes gravely ill, Alice opts out of a family spelunking vacation to nurse the pooch.

Unexpectedly, her husband’s charismatic, Nicaraguan, Harvard roommate, Abelardo - coffee planter, failed seminarian, and scion of an old Nicaraguan family - comes to visit as part of his quest to have his aunt canonized as the first Nicaraguan saint. Through a variety of somewhat bizarre and miraculous events, Abelardo must return home to his village before his canonization work is complete.

But Alice, with time on her hands and a void to fill, adopts Abelardo’s mission and becomes obsessed with helping him find the path to sanctify his ancestor. Not only does she befriend Hubert, the eccentric man in charge of New York’s hagiography club, she becomes somewhat of an expert on the various women who have achieved the distinction of sainthood, and soon finds herself on a plane destined for Nicaragua.

Abelardo’s quest to canonize his aunt, together with Alice’s quest to save her marriage, makes for a miraculous story of love, loss, and faith.

©2009 Christine Lehner (P)2013 Audible Inc.

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