Anger doesn’t just disappear. It bubbles along, it surfaces in different ways. You try not to feel it every waking minute. You learn to live with it.---Averil
In the midst of life we are in death.---from a prayer
 |
| Jaded Ibis Press |
At
Last! Women are speaking out against
abuse in Hollywood, on TV….everywhere.
The Latina Book Club salutes the silence
breakers and the survivors. Hence, when
this “brilliant, moving novel” –KINGDOM OF WOMEN by Rosalie Morales Kearns– crossed
our path, we were intrigued by its title and its exploration of violence against
women.
KINGDOM
OF WOMEN is a suspenseful, provocative, and captivating debut novel.
Rosalie
Morales Kearns has written a bold and fantastic futuristic novel with realistic
characters, fast-paced action and enough surprises to keep readers riveted. Kearns puts her Catholic school upbringing to good use
in this book. It’s peppered with
scripture and saints-name-dropping but not so much that the religious nuances
disturb the story. We have a
female priest, a revolution, and violent battle between the sexes. Many have
wondered what the world would be like if women ran things, Kearns gives us one radical
scenario.
SUMMARY: In the near future, women will be priests; North
Dakota will have seceded from the United Stations to form Erda, a republic of
women; and around the world women will form vigilante groups to fight back
against their male oppressors / rapists.
At the
heart of the revolution is Averil Parnell, one of the first female priests
ordained by the Roman Catholic Church and the sole survivor of a gunman’s
massacre of that first female graduating class. 15 Years later, the Church has banished Averil
to a small parish for she’s become a symbol and a beacon for angry women
everywhere. The FBI believes she’s involved
with the vigilantes; the Church wants her to confess to being a co-conspirator;
while the female assassins see her as the living symbol of their cause, their
saint. Meanwhile, all Averil wants is to
be left in peace to run her small church, plant her garden and come to terms
with the religious visions plaguing her and the conversations with dead monks. But the battle of the sexes becomes a reality,
and Averil is suddenly thrust into a war where women refuse to turn the other
cheek and where forgiveness is a moral failure.
ABOUT THE
AUTHOR: Rosalie Morales Kearns, a writer
of Puerto Rican and Pennsylvania Dutch descent, is the founder of Shade
Mountain Press, the author of the magic-realist story collection VIRGINS AND
TRICKSTERS, and the editor of the short story anthology THE FEMALE COMPLAINT:
TALES OF UNRULY WOMEN. A product of Catholic schooling from kindergarten
through college, Kearns has a B.A. in theology from Fordham University and an
MFA from the University of Illinois. Visit her at https://rosaliemoraleskearns.wordpress.com/kingdom-of-women/.
#ReadLatinoLit