Mirabilis

by Susann Cokal

Book Overview

In a French village beset by plague and under siege, something incredible is about to happen. Her name is Bonne Mirabilis, the illegitimate daughter of a saint burned at the stake. And she will... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0399147535
• ISBN13: 9780399147531
• Release Date: June 2001
• Publisher: Blue Hen Books
• Length: 389 Pages
• Weight: 1.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 6.3" x 9.3"
• Age Range: 14 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 9 and higher

Customer Reviews

A perfect confection of a novel

A beautifully-written story of a provincial French town in the late 14th-century. Our main character is Bonne, the bastard daughter of a woman who was said to have performed miracles. Twenty-two years later, Bonne finds herself as a nursemaid to a wealthy woman. When the town of Villanueve is besieged by the English, and the townspeople are starving, Bonne finds herself feeding most of them with her milk. This is a strongly sensual book- but, oddly enough, it is not sexual. The act of breastfeeding is treated with matter-of-factness. Bonne is a fascinating character, and I enjoyed getting "inside her head" in this powerful book about love and longing during a time of famine and plague, at a time when it was a sin to be a dwarf or a Jew. We also see the viewpoints of some of the other major characters in the book.

the magical world of Mirabilis

A beautifully written story about love, loss, faith, and desire, Mirabilis is set in the mystical town of Villeneuve--a place populated by mischevious dwarves, mercenary priests, magicians, and so-called saints. It is a place of magic and miracles, sickness and cruelty, and from the first sentence, this novel will transport you to the dark, ruthless world of medieval France. Cokal is a captivating story-teller, and this is one of the best historical novels that I've read. I highly recommend it.

Beautifully erotic

Mirabilis is a triumph of a story that is, in fact, much more than just a story. Reading this I thought of the sexual strategies used by Angela Carter in her novels, and at the same time, I pictured the French landscape Cokal uses as her setting, as something out of a Peter Greenaway film. Lush, brilliant, vibrant. Cokal raises serious questions about the Body and its representations. One of the better novels of the year.

best book of the summer!

Mirabilis is a magical romp (and sometimes a leisurely bask) in medieval France ... I'd never read a book about a wet nurse before, but Cokal makes what seems to us a bizarre profession into a delightful contemplation of how a woman can be strategic with her body and her social position in a difficult world. The supporting characters are engaging and sometimes hilarious--the naughty, crazy dwarf, the saintly, crazy sculptor, and the beautiful, erotic, and probably crazy woman who hires Bonne and makes love to her ... I've never read anything quite like this!

A work of heavenly perfection and earthly passion

Wonderful! An engrossing tale of a medieval wet nurse that follows her from an inauspicious birth into worthlessness to a lauded position in her village, where she has been and continues to be viewed by some with suspicion. Through dark and tangled forests, carefully maintained bright castle gardens, streets covered with thorns and excrement, and places spiritual and secular that are simultaneously consecrated and unholy, Susann Cokal has written a novel that uses archetypal figures and locations in a way that transcends symbolic confinement and creates a unique and often erotic world that is deeply rooted and alive. Her characters, especially the titular Bonne, are fascinating, psychologically complex, and so well developed that they remain conscious in your mind both between readings and after the novel ends, causing you to wonder about them and their current lives as one would think of a friend. This is a world that I will continue to hold in my mind and a book I will revisit often.