The Nobel Prize-winning novelist Sigrid Undset was a Catholic convert, Third Order Dominican, and a Norwegian. As a fellow convert, lay Dominican in formation, and Scandinavian, and as a huge fan of her novel Kristin Lavransdatter, I feel as though Undset and I might have been friends - or, at least, I would have been her adoring fan girl and she'd have tolerated my enthusiastic adoration in a spirit of Christian charity.

My husband gave me Undset's biography of St. Catherine of Siena for Christmas, and finally, for Lent, I've been able to read it. Catherine of Siena does not disappoint. Undset's knowledge and love of medieval culture and her novelist's eye gives a richness to Catherine and her story that I suspect few other storytellers have achieved.

Catherine was graced very early in her life with mystical visions and heroic holiness, and as is the case with lifelong saints, some hagiographers have difficulty finding and showing the inner conflict that makes a character (I'm speaking in a literary sense now) interesting to the reader. But Undset finds both the inner and exterior conflict of Catherine's life and crafts her story as only a gifted novelist can.

One interesting connection Undset makes is between Catherine and St. Birgitta (Bridget) of Sweden. These two women never met, and yet Undset devotes half a chapter to the role Birgitta plays in Catherine's drama. Birgitta was noblewoman and a visionary, and bringing both her spiritual understanding and her political acumen to the fore, she fearlessly worked to convince the Avignon popes to return to Rome. Unfortunately, Birgitta did not achieve success in her lifetime; instead, she paved the way for Catherine, who inherited her mission:

. . . before Birgitta had closed her eyes in death the Sienese virgin had taken her work upon herself, and it was Catherine's destiny to carry it out. She was to be the master tool in the hand of God to bring St. Peter's successor back to his home besides the graves of St. Peter and St. Paul. (pg. 139)

This is the novelist's bird's-eye view, seeing connections between the pieces of the story where the characters themselves can not. This ability allows Undset to see the spiritual connection between the two. It's a saintly connection, and I think it's just awesome.

I've enjoyed Catherine of Siena so much that I've decided to give a copy away. If you're interested, let me know either in the comments box (if I don't know you personally, leave some sort of contact info, like your Twitter handle) or via email (the link is at the top right corner of the website). I'll draw a name this coming Monday, 3/21, and send it out right away. Thanks to Amazon Prime, it should arrive on your doorstep just in time for the Triduum.

St. Catherine, pray for us!

Update 3/21/16: And the winner is... Heidi K.! Congratulations!

I love Flannery O'Connor. I really do. While I have to be in the right mood for reading her short stories (which, according to my former professor, "is like eating power-punched potato chips"), I could read her essays anytime, anywhere.

Hers is an amazing voice and talent; her ability to spot incongruencies and blow them up to the point of surrealism is exceptional. She can make me laugh. I hope I'm half the writer she was by the time I die.

But she also annoys me, though it's not her fault. What gets to me is the cult of Flannery. When you've hung around Catholic literary circles long enough, you're bound to hear your fair share of Flannery adulation. She's become a patron saint of the Hopeful Revival of Faithful Catholic Literature, you see.

Because she's so well loved, O'Connor's Catholic detractors are unlikely to receive a lot of sympathy. Last year's Crisis article by James Bernens, in which he criticizes the "artlessness and crudity of her style," garnered over 160 comments—for a web post about a deceased writer of short stories, that's a lot. Bernens said That Which Must Never Be Said, and he paid for it.

It's a spiteful sliver of the old devil left in me, but all this dead seriousness and hearing her praises sung again and again makes me not want to read her work. Ever. Sticking out my tongue right now.

(I hope she's chuckling at my childishness up there in Glory Land.)

My issues regarding the Flannery Following aside, it's great that we continue to raise questions about Catholic art and culture. It's great that larger Catholic publishing houses like Loyola Press, Ave Maria Press, and Ignatius Press have published at least a few quality new and rediscovered works of Catholic fiction. It's great that Dappled Things exists (and humbling for me that I can play a small part in it).

The pre-Vatican II writers of Flannery & Co. were able to get a toehold in the secular publishing market. But that was 1960. This is 2016. We need all the internal support we can get if Catholic fiction is ever going to see a revival beyond our little enclave.

What's tough for us aspiring writers of Catholic fiction is that, unlike the Protestants, we don't have large publishing houses accepting and releasing shelves upon shelves of mass-marketed (but distinctively Catholic!) mostly-crap. If I were to write a Catholic-Amish romance story, it had better be a damn good Catholic-Amish romance story or no one is going to publish it. 

On second thought, maybe that's a good problem to have.