Sacred Hearts

by Sarah Dunant

* The latest novel from the bestselling author of The Birth of Venus and In The Company of The Courtesan, out now in paperback.

1570 in the Italian city of Ferrara.

Sixteen-year-old Serafina is fipped by her family from an illicit love affair and forced into the convent of Santa Caterina, renowned for its superb music. Serafina's one weapon is her glorious voice, but she refuses to sing.

Madonna Chiara, an abbess as fluent in politics as she is in prayer, finds her new charge has unleased a power play - rebellion, ecstasies and hysterias - within the convent.

However, watching over Serafina is Zuana, the sister in charge of the infirmary, who understands and might even challenge her incarceration.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, Historical, Italy, Religion, Book Club, Renaissance

472 pages, Paperback

First published December 7, 2008

About the author

Sarah Dunant is a cultural commentator, award-winning thriller writer and author of five novels set in Renaissance Italy exploring women’s lives through art, sex and religion. She has two daughters, and lives in London and Florence.

Sarah’s monthly history program and podcast on history can be found via the BBC website.

Reviews

[Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

I expected a book about sixteenth century convent life and its nuns to be boring. What I did not expect was Sacred Hearts by Sarah Dunant her third (and probably her best) novel set in the Italian Renaissance (following In the Company of a Courtesan and The Birth of Venus). I was instantly captivated by the sisters of Santa Caterina, a fictional convent comprised of a group of highly sophisticated women as embroiled in politics, scandal, and deception as their courtly counterparts. Dunant achieves for nuns what Ken Follett did for monks in his epic Pillars of the Earth.

This novel opens with the newest novice sixteen-year-old former noble, Serafina. More rebellious teen then a dutiful daughter, Serafina is too expensive and too much of a liability to marry off, so she is passed over in favor of her younger sister, and forced to take the veil. (This practice Dunant notes is very common though cruel). Serafina is highly valued to the convent both for her beautiful singing voice, and the generous dowry her family has promised. However the only vow Serfina makes is to herself--promising to escape at her earliest opportunity.

Serafina is contrasted with Zuana, a once defiant and now compliant nun. Zuana takes Serafina under her wing to try and ease Serafina’s transition from court to convent. Both women soon become embroiled in the shifting alliances of the convent and rapidly changing religious atmosphere which could forever alter Santa Caterina as they know it.

Dunant’s sumptuous rendition bestows life into the convent and the time. The setting becomes an examination for the roles of women. The convent offered a surprising amount of freedom and protection for those within its walls—a truth which Dunant does not fail to capture. The plot is secondary to the historical context of the book, but still remains engaging. The only disappointment is the story’s ending which not only borders on blaspheme but also seems out of the character for the women as the reader knows them. And so, I’ll be recommending it to everyone except my intensely Catholic grandmother. Still, Sacred Hearts is an obviously well researched and breath-taking work of Historical Fiction.

[Judy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Today a woman can be single and have a career and a joyful life. During the Victorian era many a maiden aunt was taken in as helper in the homes of better off relatives. But in the 16th century, we find that many aristocratic Italian families, only being able to afford one dowry, would force one girl into marriage and dispatch the other young women to convents.

At first I found Sarah Dunant’s "Sacred Hearts" claustrophobic (it all takes place behind convent walls) and uninviting. I so enjoyed "In the Company of the Courtesan" that I was rooting for "Sacred Hearts" to unfold and wrap me up. And Dunant pulled it off!

Her novel – of convent politics, of trust and betrayal, of true believers and those who make the convent into the only life they can – slowly worked its way into my awareness. The protagonist is fairly interesting, and we wonder will she find a way to escape this life, or will she wind up being an anorexic religious zealot. But the women we really watch and question are Suora Zuana, the dispensary mistress and tender healer, and Madre Chiara, the abbess who makes convent politics into a blood sport.

Thank you, goodreads.com and Random House for including "Sacred Hearts" as part of the goodreads giveaway.

[WarpDrive · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has been quite a pleasant surprise. The setting of this nice historical novel is a convent in the elegant and pleasant city of Ferrara, during the Italian Renaissance not long after the Council of Trent.

Ferrara is unfairly neglected as a tourist destination in many tourist routes, which is quite baffling as the city is very charming, a real place that has proudly retained a genuine sense of its medieval and renaissance past. I visited the city in my latest trip to Europe, and it was a nice aesthetic and cultural experience - this was also one of the reasons why I was initially attracted to this book.

I started reading the book with some misgivings, as I have encountered, in the past, so many similar novels written with an almost complete misunderstanding and a cheap trivializing of the complex political and social cultural setting of Italian Renaissance and of convent life during this fascinating historical period.
The author has, on the contrary, actually made a real effort to investigate the historical and geographical background of her novel, and the result is a credible and interesting narrative, where power intrigues and tensions of life in an enclosed environment are played against the fluid cultural and political backdrop of Post-reformation Italy.
Even the history and architecture of this fictitious convent are drawn heavily from the still existing enclosed Benedictine community of Sant'Antonio in Polesine in Ferrara. The author even bothered to research the peculiar weather and climate of this city, so characteristic of the Po Valley, and that local inhabitants, since time immemorial, have learned to hate and love.

Most characters are depicted with introspection and nuance, their psychological interplay is interesting and only occasionally it degenerates into fluffiness or saccharine romance, and I also appreciated how the author managed to develop, forcefully but with taste and sophistication, a quite clear feminist message – the strong, complex, contradictory and fascinating personality of the Abbess is a high point of the entire narrative, and the formidable Suora Umiliana, and Suora Zuana with her love for books and science, are quite remarkable too (on the other hand, the character of the novice Serafina is probably the weakest, a spoiled brat in love with her equally forgettable fiance - both of them seriously irked me more than once). And it is a poignant reminder that, even in Europe, and until very recently in historical terms, women did not even begin to have the equality of rights that, to some extent, they now enjoy at least in parts of the world.

The psychological and material life in the convent are also very nicely portrayed (without ever degenerating into the so many cheap clichés that infest so much historical fiction set in medieval / renaissance convents) illustrating the complex relationship between the religious life and power politics in the outside world, and all of its contradictions, but without degenerating into apologism, nor into cheap anti-Catholic railing.

3.5 stars (rounded up to 4 given that it was better than I feared).

[Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

Any reader of my reviews knows that I’m a sucker for historical fiction. If it sucks, I will finish it anyway, bitching all the way. If it’s good, I thank the fiction gods above. Sometimes it’s hard to find that good novel that makes an honest attempt at historical facts and attitudes while also maintaining an engaging writing style. Sarah Dunant’s Sacred Hearts has it nailed.

I’ve read several of Dunant’s novels before, all set in Renaissance Italy. She has a fascination with women, art, and the Counter Reformation. This one is no different. Set in Italian convent of Santa Caterina, it explores the world of high-born nuns who aren’t necessarily in the convent for spiritual reasons. Because the price of dowries skyrocketed in the 16th century, many noble women were placed in nunneries at a far reduced price, imprisoning women who had no desire to enter a marriage with Christ. To alleviate these woes, Dunant’s Santa Caterina convent allows these women to be nominally nuns, but to also pursue the art of music, writing, and conversation. Amidst all of these noble nuns is Zuana, the herbalist in charge of the infirmary. Steady and faithful, she is put in charge of a troublesome, duplicitous, frightened novice. As Zuana struggles with her own beliefs, the structural hierarchy begins to fall around her as the Counter Reformation picks up steam.

Sacred Hearts is so well-written that you feel encased in the walls of the fictional convent, even a little frightened when you get brief glimpses of the outside world. You follow these nuns in their ecstasies, in their hysterias, and in their struggle to preserve their way of life from infiltrating fanaticism. It’s almost a shock when the novel comes to its inevitable end because it’s like leaving otherworldly sisters behind. Maybe it’s because I went to an all girls camp for 10 years, but I was comfortable in that women’s world, their haven from the rules of patriarchy. Whatever it is, I look forward to re-reading this book when I have the time.

[Kate Quinn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Novels about nuns are difficult to get right. Many are too evangelical; others simply seize the trappings of veils and prayers as a dramatic setting for a forbidden love story. Sarah Dunant's "Sacred Hearts" gets it right: a passionate but balanced story of a nunnery in Renaissance Italy poised on the brink of change. The convent is presented as an insular but surprisingly sophisticated little sphere, worldly enough to accept an Abbess with political connections and sisters who took their vows more to escape marriage than to praise God. Suora Zuana, the convent infirmarian, observes all with wry humor, and her scholarly obsession with herbal medicine is as much accepted as the nuns who keep lapdogs in their rooms. But change is coming from the first ripples of the Counter-Reformation which seeks to punish such worldly and lenient houses of prayer, and the first ripple hits the convent in the form of Serafina, a defiant young novice. Serafina is beautiful, rich, sweet-voiced, and absolutely determined to escape the convent - and her rebellion forces all the nuns, from the worldly Abbess to the contemplative Zuana, to examine their lives in a new light. A sober but transcendent read.

[Emma Deplores Goodreads Censorship · Rating 2 out of 5]

I loved the idea of this book. It’s set in a 16th century Italian convent--while convents often appear on the periphery in historical fiction, I was eager to get a more in-depth look inside one. And the book revolves around two potentially great characters: Serafina, a rebellious teenage novice, is the focal point of the story, while most of the book is told from the point-of-view of Zuana, a reluctant nun who nevertheless has found much to appreciate in convent life. Zuana in particular ought to have been fantastic: she’s not particularly pious for her time, and in our time would probably have been a doctor. In the convent, she’s the “dispensary mistress,” essentially acting as a doctor--a freedom she didn’t have in the outside world--but she still sometimes chafes at the convent’s restrictions, even though she doesn’t regret not having a husband or children.

But despite its potential, what stands out about this book is its lack of plot and tension. It takes an awfully long time to get started and never really gains momentum. Serafina acts rebellious, but we mostly see that through Zuana’s eyes, and there isn’t much going on in Zuana’s life. She treats sick people. She has a subdued rivalry with a more conservative nun. She worries about increasing restrictions on convents, a fear that never materializes in the actual book. And.... that’s about it. Zuana has already made her major decisions and come to terms with her life before the book begins. Most of the novel is just daily life and it’s all very subdued, without even much sense of simmering tension beneath the surface.

Maybe that’s the point--that convent life is subdued--but for that kind of book to work for me, I need more. More in-depth, insightful characterization. More elegant writing. More of an ability to make everyday life compelling. As is, it’s just a slow book that doesn’t compensate with extra depth.

Learning a bit about convent life was interesting. More could have been done with the idea that the convent is simultaneously restrictive and liberating (a place where women govern themselves and can pursue some career interests, but where everyday life is strictly regulated). Unfortunately, this book turned out to be bland and predictable, developing exactly as I’d guessed it would. The characters never leaped off the page, the slow-as-molasses story never hooked me, the cultural detail set the stage but never reached the level of being fascinating in its own right. I wish I’d been able to like this book more and am rather impressed with the people who did; to me it seemed uninspired, a sad waste of potential. Dunant mentions in the Author’s Note that some nuns resisted new restrictions on convents--even physically fighting back--and I was left wondering why she didn’t write that story instead.

[Doug Bradshaw · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rather than re-tell the story, here are my observations about this excellent but hard book:

1. From the very first page, a very bleak and lugubrious picture of the life of a Nun in the convents of 1500's Italy is painted. The picture is probably accurate, but it is a torturous read, like reading about the world of slavery in early America.

2. Sarah's writing is excellent and a joy to read. The lives of the four main characters are perfectly drawn and the interplay between them is a great work of psychology, similar to the three main characters in the movie "Doubt."

3. Sarah was a little bit too harsh with her portrayal of some of the leadership of the convent, especially the male leaders, but also several of the Nuns. For me, it would have been more effective if these leaders had some sympathetic traits along with all of their horrible traits such as bleeding hemorrhoids and whatnot. Even though the personalities may be based on real people, it makes for a bit of a negative read. Too negative.

4. There are powerful and tearful moments when one of the Nuns stands up to the leadership to lovingly sacrifice her own status to protect the life of an innocent girl who is being manipulated and pulled at from many directions. The whole read was worth the great affect a couple of these scenes had on me. There could have been more of these moments and less lecturing about some of the psychological nightmares and intellectually messed up personalities these conditions created for the women who ended up there for various reasons. It is obviously very anti religion and Catholic and even though I'm somewhat of that persuasion myself, the railing becomes a bit mucho.

This is a well written and powerful historical novel. Sarah is one of my favorite authors because of her excellent book, "In the Company of a Courtesan". Give it a shot, especially if you are tempted to be a Nun.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Sacred Hearts" is Sarah Dunant's best novel yet, and one of the very best I've read in a long time. Through her exquisite writing Dunant brings to life, vividly and intimately, the realities of convent life in 16th-century Italy. The struggle between piety and politics, spirituality and sensuality, as well as faith and science is powerfully depicted in this engaging story. We come to know well the women whose everyday lives we are made privy to and see, and feel, the turmoil beneath the apparent calm and order of the Sisters of Santa Caterina.

Yet what we sense most clearly are the efforts of these women to do the best they can within the limits of their cloistered existence. Each, in her own way, finds means to demonstrate her faith through works that benefit others. The over-arching theme of friendship, self-sacrifice, and unconditional love comes across beautifully and compellingly. That Dunant accomplished this without resorting to sex, violence, offensive language, or tasteless sensationalism of any kind is a testament to her superior writing skills and story-telling ability.

[Jane · Rating 4 out of 5]

A closed society of its own--a 16th century Italian convent of Benedictines set in the tumultuous times of Counter Reformation. Women didn't have much option in those days--marriage to someone of the father's choosing, as a "maiden aunt" in the bosom of the extended family or life immured in a convent. We meet Serafina, a novice who entered unwillingly; she said the vows of novitiate with her mouth, "not her heart." We see the infirmarian, Zuana, who takes the young girl under her wing as the daughter she will never have and realizes she is not nun-material; the politically-wise abbess, Madonna Chiara; the mystic Magdalena, the power-hungry and controlling novice mistress, Umiliana [sardonic name--"humility"] and others. We live their life of work and prayer with them and suffer their upheavals and crises.

I liked the very unexpected twists and turns in this story of women with normal emotions--love and jealousy. The author imbued her characters with strong, often clashing personalities. As well as well-written, the story felt well-researched.

Highly recommended. I thought this one of the author's best novels.

[Michelle]

"We ve come a long way, baby. It may be clich�d, but Sacred Hearts shows the reader the strides women have made in the world. I remain utterly horrified at the fact that so many women were forced into the convents. When your options are to marry the man your father tells you to marry, submit to his whims and caprices, abuse and philandering, I imagine the convent was the best choice for some. Still, that doesn t make it fundamentally right. Everyone deserves the chance to choose their life.[return:][return:]The story revolves around Serafina, who had the temerity to fall in love with a man who was not her father s choice for marriage. Rather than let her live her life as a pauper, as she chose, he opts to lock her away in Santa Caterina for the rest of her life. Her reaction at such treatment and at her incarceration is easily explainable, if not completely understandable. It evokes an immediate emotional, visceral response in the reader that continues throughout her experiences and adjustments to life in the convent.[return:][return:]

It also revolves around Suora Zuana. Her story is a bit more complicated, as she was the only child of a brilliant doctor who taught her almost everything he knew. Upon his sudden death and with a dearth of close relatives, her only option was the convent since no one wanted a young, educated woman as a wife. Serafina may have been forced into the convent by family members, but Zuana was forced into that life through a severe lack of options for women. Neither one went willingly. They both struggle(d) to adapt to the lifestyle. While helping Serafina through her rebellion, Zuana recalls her own struggles and rebellious spirit and discovers that she wasn t able to bury it as deeply as she once believed.[return:][return:]

In addition, Ms. Dunant introduces the reader to convent life in 16th century Italy. Given women s current freedoms of religion and speech and all other manners of freedom, the lifestyle is particularly horrifying. Rigid and hypocritical, stultifying and limiting, but all done in the name of God - it again is an area that makes the reader want to get down on her knees to say a prayer of thanks that women have come so far from this unenlightened time period.[return:][return:]

Whatever problems one may have with the time period and the lifestyle presented, Sacred Hearts is very much a feminist novel. Serafina and Zuana must navigate a world in which everything is stacked against them. These two women, their struggles, triumphs and defeats make for a fascinating and heart-wrenching story. The reader is taken on an emotional roller coaster through their travails, made all the more profound by comparisons with current societal norms and female standing in society. In fact, the reader cannot help but compare the life for Serafina and Zuana with her own life. However, therein lies the attraction because it is only in understanding the past where women can appreciate current successes and focus on the next hurdle to overcome. It also helps the reader appreciate all women who were forced into such situations, admire their strength, courage and willpower to not just live but thrive in a society that was so harsh for women.[return:][return:]

I loved this book. I found it extremely thought-provoking, so much so that I ve carried the book with me since finishing in order to be able to flip through the pages and reread certain passages again. I waffled between horror at the lifestyle, situations, and societal norms of the time and utter admiration for the women who were able to beat the odds and thrive in such an anti-female society. The amateur historian in me appreciates the depths of research Ms. Dunant reached and the detail of convent life, music, pharmacology and other aspects of society that she brings to life. For through Ms. Dunant, Serafina, Zuana and all the other sisters are alive. Their Sacred Hearts live on and are dedicated to all the women who remain oppressed and shut away from life.[return:][return:]Thank you to Random House for the opportunity to review this ARC!"

[Orinoco Womble (tidy bag and all) · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'll admit I was spoiled for this novel by having read and re-read In This House of Brede for the past, oh 40 years it must be now. If you want an in-depth look at a Benedictine monastery, warts and all, you can't do better than Godden's masterpiece. It too is set at a time of change and upheaval--the Vatican II conferences of the 1960s; and I can't get away from the thought that Dunant, also British, was in a way trying to emulate this earlier work in her novel.

However, Sacred Hearts is set in late 16th century Italy, not Britain. Why she couldn't have set her book in the country and culture she knows best, I could not tell you. Perhaps, like so many Elizabethan/Jacobean writers before her, she thought that she could get away with a bit more drama and excess by setting her scene "somewhere else." However her "Italian Renaissance" women talk and think and react like modern British women to a great degree. They seem to be pretending to be what they aren't, as the author tries to fit herself into a different culture and quite possibly a different religion. I have no idea if Dunant is a Catholic or a lizard, but it doesn't seem to be second-nature to her as it would be to anyone born and bred in it. I have lived most of my life in a nation that is nominally Catholic; my city is steeped in it, even as most of the citizens claim not to hold to its tenets. They don't have to; it's part of their culture, and of the air they breathe. It doesn't seem to be for Dunant.

Though I found her prose itself engaging (having finished the book in a weekend), the characters were in the main unsympathetic, and I got the feeling Dunant herself found them so, too. By the last 50 pages, I was starting to feel tired of the whole pack of them. Dunant seems to be saying that since so many young girls were traded off to convents for convenience's sake, by extension no religious at the time really had a vocation. While I agree that closed-community life must be very difficult, for sheer mean-spiritedness most of Dunant's nuns can't be beat, and yet the infirmarian (shame she couldn't have got the specific Benedictine job titles right) is too removed, too self-involved, a shade too "impartial" to really have me on-side. The romance plot was...well, there it was. A bit convoluted, a bit overdone, more than a bit unconvincing. I'm afraid I would have found it more realistic, and indeed more interesting, if Serafina had found a way out by finding her way in. This is not a "Christian" novel (nor even specifically a "Catholic" novel), since beliefs and convictions (at least theological ones) have little or no impact on the story beyond the externals of the crucifixes, the fact of the hours, the fact of the Mass. I guess that's another thing; for an "inside story", most of it is awfully superficial. Dunant could just as well have set it in a boarding school and had the same hysteria, the same meanness, the same fussing and intrigues. Maybe not the political and economic manouevering, but very nearly.

I also doubt very much that sugar and treacle would have been quite so common in Italy in the late 1500s. In Venice, perhaps--but Ferrara? She remembered that cochineal came from the New World and was precious and hard to get; she seemed to forget that sugar did and was, too--and that honey would have been the common sweetning of the time.

It held my attention, and during the first half I was considering shelving this as "couldn't put it down." However, it lagged so much, and got so out-there by the end that I had to create a new shelf for it.

[Laura C. · Rating 4 out of 5]

We women, you know, are pretty strong. This novel shows us again, the truth of our lives by telling us a story. A story of making the best of it, of finding grace, even within unchosen boundaries. Did you know that half of all noble women in 16th century Italy were forced into nunneries because their families could afford only one lavish dowery? In her author's notes, Sarah Dunant quotes one such woman, a nun form Santi Naborre e Felice convent in Bolgna , written to the pope: "Many of us are shut up against our will and deprived of all contact with the outside world. Living with such strictness and abandoned by everyone, we have only hell in this world and the next." Within the high walls of such a nunnery, a young girl with the voice of an angel arrives, determined to escape. How she interacts with the other women there, those charged with her care, those charged with helping her find acceptance and usefulness as a bride of Christ, those charged with healing her, and those charged with adminstering her less substantual but none the less useful dowry, is the bones of the story. What is escape really? What are the consequences? This is a story of love, the love of God and of life, and that deep unconquerable light inside us. I found it timeless and compelling.

[Ali · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the third of the Italian Renaissance novels (there's no connection between them) and having read and enjoyed the other two I pounced upon this when I found it in a charity shop.

16 year old Serefina has been forced by her father to enter the convent of Santa Caterina. She rages against her confinement, and at first refuses to use her remarkable singing voice. As time goes on however Serefina becomes a pawn in the bitter power play of convent politics. Zuana the sister in charge of the infirmary - sometimes guided by her long dead father - takes special care of Serefina, as first she teaches her some healing and potions, and later comes to question whether Serefina should be in Santa Caterina at all. This is a hard to put down novel, wonderfully atmospheric and dramatic with well drawn characters and a fantastic sense of place. This is certainly my favourite of the 3 novels.

[Adam McPhee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ecclesiastical politics when you're high. These gals really knew how to do a fucking number on each other.

[Ruth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sacred Hearts is a story set in the late 1500's in an Italian convent. A few historical notes are necessary in order to fully understand the story. First, at this time in order for a noblewoman to be married as befit someone of her class, a large dowry was necessary--so large that many families couldn't afford to marry off more than one daughter. Since women needed to be taken care of, the solution was to put them in convents. According to the author, as many as 50% of the noblewomen of that time ended up as nuns, and not out of a spirit of holiness or vocation. Secondly, this book took place shortly after the Council of Trent. The short version is that the Council of Trent was the Catholic Church's response to the Protestant reformation. It tried to rid the Church of some of the abused complained about by the reformers without accepting their heretical doctrines. One thing called for by the Council of Trent was the strict enclosure of nuns and the enforcement of a simple monastic lifestyle.

This story beings the night a young novice is brought to the convent. She was in love, wanted to marry the guy, but Dad said "no" and packed her off the this convent, in a different city. She is having a tantrum and keeping everyone up. The dispensary mistress brings her a sleeping potion to calm her. Shortly thereafter the abbess assigns the novice to work with the dispensary mistress, who, twenty years ago, was quite distressed to find herself dispatched to the convent upon the death of her father.

This is really one of those books that is more about the characters than the plot. The abbess is a skilled politician and leader, trying to stave off outside interference and keep the inside troops in her corner. She realizes most of her nuns are there for practical reasons, not spiritual and while she looks after their spiritual well-being, she also tries to maintain the status quo of a reasonably pleasant lifestyle. The novice mistress is the abbess' main competitor for power, and she wants to purify the convent, make it less worldly, more focused on God. There are nuns who are insane and those who are just plain mean.

The book is very well written and contains an extensive bibliography. It is the third book in a series (I haven't read the others) about the life of women in that time. In some ways these nuns were little better than prisoners--their fathers "sentenced" them to the convent. While they had to make vows, their lack of other viable choices limited their freedom to say "no". However, the wealthy brought dowrys with them that allowed them to comfortably furnish their cells. There were servant sisters who waited on and cleaned up after the choir (wealthy) sisters. The choir sisters had a vote in the management of the convent. When compared to an arranged marriage to a man who beat you, convent life didn't look so bad.

If you like historical fiction focused on women, I think you'll like this. At 400 pages it is a little longer than my average read, but was well worth it.

[Rosie · Rating 3 out of 5]

**3,5 estrelas**

O intuito era mudar o registo de leitura, do negro para quiçá algo cor de rosa.

Recuei ao passado, meados do séc. XVI e pela mão de Sarah Dunant, entrei num convento para testemunhar as suas vivências.

De uma forma pausada e serena, tal qual o desenrolar do dia a dia onde orar e amar a Deus era a sua máxima, fui tomando contacto com o rigor, a intransigência, a frugalidade, a oração/devoção e a renúncia, suportada ou almejada. Sim, porque muitas das freiras (senão a maioria) tinham este destino, não por ser um desejo mas antes uma imposição.

As personagens são muito carismáticas e intensas.

Zuana, extraordinária! Apesar da sua condição de mulher (as oportunidades eram vetadas como sabemos ao género feminino) é mestre em reconhecer os proveitos das plantas e da natureza em geral em prol da saúde e bem estar. A vontade férrea de aprender mais e mais quando os conhecimentos são ainda tão incipientes fascinou-me. Muito humana, curiosa, inteligente, exigente consigo própria e exímia no seu talento na arte de curar.

A Abadessa revelou-se uma personagem com uma sagacidade invulgar governando o convento com uma mestria comparável a um rei no seu país. Usando todas as armas e artimanhas ao seu dispor, com o equilíbrio que lhe é imposto por Deus (ou nem sempre), mantêm e sustem com sabedoria todos os aspetos financeiros, sociais, políticos e espirituais dentro e fora de portas.

Serafina é o mote desestabilizador, que passa por vários estados, entre o tudo ou nada.

O final acabou por ser surpreendente, não estava à espera de tal rebuliço, de um reverso da medalha.

Senti que aprendi sobre estes meandros, sobre esta época em particular.
Somos ainda informados pela autora, o que me consternou deveras, que a ameaça velada no decorrer do livro, alguns anos volvidos, torna-se realidade: a severidade nos claustros torna-se ainda mais terrífica.
Uma freira descreve-o sucintamente numa carta escrita ao papa em 1586: "Muitas de nós somos encerradas contra a nossa vontade e privadas de qualquer contacto com o mundo exterior. Ao vivermos assim, com tal rigidez e abandonadas por todos temos apenas o Inferno, neste mundo e no próximo."

(não sei se estou a ser justa na minha classificação... confesso que hesitei... mas recomendo para quem gosta do género)

[Kathryn Bashaar · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was right up my alley. Not Christian fiction, which I usually find saccharine and simplistic, but literary fiction about serious Christian women. The story takes place in the fictional Benedictine abbey of Santa Caterina in Italy in the late 16th century. A new young novice arrives, clearly against her will, and her passion has an impact on the abbess, the novice mistress and especially on the dispensary sister Suora Zuana.
The novel is beautifully written and sets the reader vividly in the time and place, which good historical fiction must do. The sisters are, for the most part, genuinely and passionately devout. But, they are certainly human, and we learn of their pride and their occasional despair and their disagreements. The abbess is as ruthless and politically astute as a modern corporate executive, as any leader of an large enterprise must be. And the abbey is definitely an enterprise, in addition to being a place of seclusion and worship.
I loved that this book treated the Christian devotion of the sisters with great respect, and still made them human. Their world is not ours. It is astonishing to realize how far the West has come from an era when a significant portion of the female population spent most of their lives in seclusion where they sorrowfully and ecstatically contemplated Christ's suffering.
On a personal note, I loved the descriptions of the family visiting days. As a small child in the 1960s, I witnessed the very end of that era. My mother had three cousins who were nuns, and the whole extended family would go and visit them at the convent on visiting days. I remember my family's pride that we had three brides of Christ in the family. Then came the 1970s and each of them in turn rejected the veil. Two of them are long-married grandmothers today.
My only complaint about this book is that it was pretty slow paced. Well, it is about 16th-century nuns, after all. And I think she slow pace helps with the setting. Anyway, it's well worth the read; the ending does not disappoint.
Like my reviews? Check out my blog at http://www.kathrynbashaar.com/blog/

[Sterlingcindysu · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a great book, combining history, religion, moral dilemnas, music, medicine--lots of research here! This is the first of Dunant's books I've read. It was a "thick" read, with lots of details of the daily life of a convent in 1540, describing clothes, food, music, everything. I really appreciated the daily order of offices, not being Catholic myself I had no idea nuns woke up at 2 AM everyday (or used to). (copied review) In 16th-century Italy, convents aren't merely for housing religious orders--they're also places for noble familes to dump their spare daughters, often against the girls' wishes. Sixteen-year-old novice Serafina, a gifted singer recently torn from the arms of her impoverished lover and placed in the convent of Santa Caterina by her wealthy father, is determined to escape the cloisters. Suora (Sister) Zuana, the convent's apothecary, befriends the girl out of sympathy for her plight: Zuana, a physician's daughter, only ever wanted to serve Science, not God. If you like reading about women who struggle against the social constraints of their time, be sure to read this absorbing book by the author of The Birth of Venus and In the Company of the Courtesan.

[Carol, She's so Novel ꧁꧂ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading this book made me realise that it has been too long since I had read any historical fiction.

I knew many unmarried European women from the Renaissance entered nunneries, but assumed it was from having a vocation or as punishment from a tyrannical father for disobedience. I had no idea that either marriage or the nunnery option were the only choices.

Our heroine wasn't brought up to accept this fate & the book becomes a study of her plotting to escape, the kindly Suora Zuoana, & the zealous
Suora & the politically shrewd Madonna Chiara , trying to preserve a way of life.

I absolutely could not put it down & will be searching out more of Dunant's books

[Gina *loves sunshine* · Rating 2 out of 5]

Birth of Venus is the only other book I have read by this author, and it's hard for me to not make the comparison! I loved birth of Venus, was totally captured by the story and the characters. But this one fell flat for me. I was drawn to the main character and the banter of the nuns -it was very call the midwife! But the overall story just did not have the mystery and the pull that I enjoy.

[Joana’s World · Rating 3 out of 5]

Adoro ler sobre segredos dos conventos e Sociedade na época e tudo mais, mas esperava um pouco mais deste livro.

[Patrícia · Rating 4 out of 5]

A chamada Idade Moderna sempre foi a minha preferida. A minha paixão avassaladora pelo Renascimento, principalmente o italiano, encontrou o seu meio de inspiração em Sarah Dunant há já algum tempo. O Nascimento de Vénus é um dos meus livros preferidos de sempre (já a ser transposto para filme) e Na Companhia da Cortesã é um dos livros mais encantadoramente estranhos que já li.
Portanto foi com altas expectativas que li Corações Sagrados e que me deixei de novo envolver pela bela e intensamente maravilhosa escrita desta senhora, que consegue sempre apresentar-nos as suas histórias de uma forma lírica e através das personagens mais perfeitas, tanto no mal como no bem que existe em cada ser humano. A forma como a história nos é contada é um ataque a todos os nossos sentidos, destina-se a colocar-nos na pele das personagens, a aceitá-las e compreende-las em vez de as adorarmos, a vivermos cada momento como se elas fossem reais, como se pudéssemos ser uma delas.
Sarah Dunant tem uma escrita única que nos envolve e conquista e um cuidado imenso para não falhar os pormenores históricos, notando-se que o trabalho de pesquisa não fica só pelo geral mas vai aos mais ínfimos pormenores, existe uma preocupação pelas “pequenas coisas” que escapam a muitos escritores de romances históricos.
Este Corações Sagrados tem uma história diferente dos outros dois que já havia lido e o mais centrado no mundo feminino dos três e também o que tem menor espaço geográfico e quantidade de personagens, o que me fez estranhar ao início. E se calhar, é por isso mesmo que melhor se nota o talento para criar as mais diversas personagens, cada uma com uma história pessoal e uma personalidade distinta, que a autora tem.
Entrelaçando as vidas de várias mulheres, os seus segredos e histórias de vida, acompanhamos não uma história principal mas várias que irão desenvolver e criar as relações que aparecem entre todas estas mulheres, umas de mais fé do que outras, mas todas apaixonadas por algo.
Uma história sobre a fé e o amor, a não liberdade das mulheres, sobre uma sociedade que entregava as filhas ao casamento ou com Deus ou com o homem contra a sua vontade, este livro relata a força de vontade e a coragem das mulheres que aceitavam os seus destinos e aprendiam a tirar proveito dele e daquelas que contra todos sonharam e conquistaram o seu próprio final.
É difícil não me sentir cativada por algo que venha desta autora pois ela consegue sempre surpreender-me das mais diversas formas, criando sempre algo diferente e superando-se a si mesma, usando os mais diversos cenários e criando as mais magníficas personagens, introduzindo as suas histórias nos vários diferentes momentos da Renascença italiana, com ou sem personagens históricas verídicas.

http://girlinchaiselongue.blogspot.co...

[C.W. · Rating 5 out of 5]

An era convulsed by religious reformation and a convent on the threshold of irrevocable change are the basis for Sarah Dunant's eloquent, compelling third novel in her Renaissance trilogy, SACRED HEARTS.

When young and willful Serafina is immured against her wishes in the Convent of Santa Caterina, in the Italian city of Ferrara, she is merely following in the terrible footsteps of countless unwanted or tarnished girls before her. It is estimated that by the late 16th century, dowries had grown so exorbitant that almost half of the noble women in Italy were obliged to take the veil. But Serafina's rebellion is not like that of other girls'; heart-wrenching, relentless, and ultimately explosive, the disruption she creates sets off a series of events that grow to involve the wry dispensary mistress, the worldly abbess, and ambitious novice mistress. Each sees in Serafina a means of deliverance or downfall; each aspires to influence the wayward girl's course. But as they struggle to subdue the passion in Serafina's rebellious soul, each finds she must come to terms with the sorrows, lost hopes, and decisions of her own past as well as the unstoppable changes bearing down on the convent from the outside.

SACRED HEARTS is an extraordinary journey into a world we rarely see, a place where women sacrificed their personal desires and dreams to come together for safety. Though set within a convent, Dunant offers a rich and complex tale that will speak to anyone who has longed for redemption and fought for the impossible.

[Lory · Rating 1 out of 5]

I won this book in the give-away--my first. I had high hopes. I've tried picking it up again and again and have read several books in between each time I picked it up. So far, I've made it to page 95. It's very slow and tedious, if you're looking for a page-turner, you won't find it here. Since I am not a Roman Catholic, I had also hoped to gain some insights, maybe they're in there somewhere but so far, this book is just plain boring.

[Maria Lavrador · Rating 4 out of 5]

Segundo livro desta autora q mais uma vez me apresenta uma história bem escrita e desenvolvida, desta vez passada num convento, centrada numa noviça à força que vem desestabilizar o equilíbrio precário lá existente

[Marie Burton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Honestly, in the back of my mind as I was enjoying the words of this book that I was reading, I had the seed of doubt already planted that I would be able to have the fortitude to write a review that could do this novel justice. Given the truth that on the outside, the setting may seem a bit bland to some - a nunnery back in the old days- 'how exciting can that be?'- I was intrigued, enthralled, engrossed with everything that went on within those convent walls.

And there is not a wide cast of characters here. We have the abbess of the convent Madonna Chiara, the dispensary nun Zuana, and the novice nun Serafina, along with the additional cloister of nuns who add depth and flavor to the story. This is a story that is multi-faceted from the struggles of the faith of the women, from lessons on herbs and medicine, young love, stigmatas and on to the descriptions of what lengths the convent goes to in order to promote a woman's worthiness for God. What happened in mid-1500's to the unwed women in Italy is that they went to a nunnery. The dowries were so high that if there was more than one daughter in the house, they could barely afford for one daughter to wed. That is where the novel opens up as we meet the newest unwilling member of the convent, Serafina, who is thrust into this unknown world by her family who have cruelly abondoned her. Sister Zuana is chosen to be a guide for Serafina, though with all the strict confines and rules of a nunnery it is difficult for them to gauge each other's character or even ask questions of each other. Throughout the story we are touched by these two women as they each struggle with their own questions of faith, of their needs, of friendship, and how they prepare themselves for God.
"So that in the end the only real choice open to a young woman was to yell herself into crazed silence or, with God's grace, find the wit to turn rebellion into acceptance of what cannot be resisted. Just as so many others had done before her."


Serafina, a young woman, was in no way prepared to be forced into the society of saintly and religious routines, and how and if she accepts this fate is what the novel's events center on. Zuana is reminiscent of how she once was in Serafina's shoes as a novice nun unprepared for the abrupt change in the way to live within this restrictive society sixteen years before Serafina's own arrival. Although Zuana does not show outward compassion towards Serafina, she tries subtly to make her understand that 'resistance is.. fruitless', and Zuana is fully drawn to this young woman. We experience Zuana's whimsical thoughts of what life would be for her if she had not entered the convent decades earlier, as Zuana was also not bred merely for convent life to serve God, she had a natural calling to serve others with her expertise of herbal remedies.

Each of these women possess a talent that uniquely separates them from the rest. Zuana is the dispensary clerk and through her rare upbringing she has the knowledge that rivals that of a doctor, and is invaluable with her medicinal herbs for the convent. And Novice Serafina is young, beautiful, rebelliously in love, and is a song bird that outshines any other. The realization that their lives are meant for God is something that both the women think about and we are let into their minds to witness their profound journeys. Within these walls of which they are trapped they are required to conform to the strict rules of the convent. Even sheltered from society they are not immune to the religious reformation taking place and how their church believes that they should be doing more honoring of God then is already being done; things have the potential to get even stricter than they are accustomed to and simple luxuries that are already few and far between may be taken away right down to the Choir.


Sacred Hearts was well-written with its flair of nostalgia and historical importance as I found the writing to be fast paced within a slow moving yet suspenseful spiritual journey; the pleasing prose had me from the onset. I valued the small psalms, prayers, quotes that were interspersed into the story and also appreciated the fact that this was treated as a novel and not as an effort to preach to whether God exists and how we should feel about that. The rare criticism of the writing is that there were a few times when the story was being told through one nun's eyes and then we stopped the timeline and went back to the other nun and their point of view of the same event which was really unneccessary and disrupted the flow, but thankfully occurred only a few times. It was difficult to get used to the idea of the women being in cells, in essentially a prison, regardless of what they had wanted out of their life. It brings to mind the thought of how many women truly perished within a nunnery, whose life meant nothing to no one but themselves and God, all because they did not have the money to marry. There is an intriguing plot that wraps you up in the suspense of how Serafina reacts to her fate, as she believes that her only way to survive is to escape. And when she attempts that, her reversal of fortune is life threatening and shocking.

And as expected, I can not do this novel justice within my review for fear of giving away the whole thing.. but this is a must read, I loved it, and felt very introspective while reading it. I am blessed to be born in these modern days so that I can have the freedom make my own life altering choices.

Full review and book trailer on my blog: http://burtonreview.blogspot.com/2009...

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

Every time I listened to this book, I felt transported to the halls of a sixteenth century convent. So many novels use convents as backdrops for either forbidden love affairs or terrible cruelty stories, but Dunant draws a much more balanced picture. She does not shy away from the fact of Renaissance life that many younger sisters in noble families as well as any women who were lame, deformed by disease, or simply not pretty enough for marriage were forced against their will into convents. But Dunant also demonstrates that (prior to the Counter Reformation) women had freedom to compose music, write and perform sacred plays, and study herbal remedies in these cloistered communities—things they would have never been allowed to do in the outside world. I knew some of this from my art history studies in college, but it is gratifying to see it brought out in fiction.

The central plot line of the book surrounds a young novice Serafina who is placed in the convent against her will and the turmoil she brings to the cloistered sisters of Santa Caterina. The girl is assigned to work with Zuana, the dispensary nurse. Zuana’s father was a doctor and taught her about herbs and healing. She sees all medicines as part of God’s divine beauty and power. Zuana’s own acquiescence to convent life was hard-won sixteen years earlier, and she tries to ease the girl’s adjustment. While it is Serafina’s drama which drives the plot, it is Zuana’s own intensely spiritual character and journey that captures the reader’s imagination.

I found myself thinking deeply about how I would feel in cloistered life, then or now. There are aspects that are intuitively appealing to me, the profound contemplation and prayer and the harmonious existence within liturgical seasons. On the other hand, many nuns in Santa Caterina (such as Zuana) often feel lacking in their connection to Christ, and wish for visions or spiritual ecstasies which they never experience. It reminds me of how those of us who don’t have dramatic conversion stories sometimes feel unworthy or as if we have missed some vital part of our religious existence. Yet I believe this book does an excellent job of conveying the fact that Christ speaks to and works through us all in different ways and through our different talents. It’s not a fast-moving book, but beautiful and enlightening. The audiobook reader was also excellent, and I highly recommend it.

[Tempo de Ler · Rating 4 out of 5]

Um jogo de percepções tão bem conjugado que nos mergulha numa viagem de combate entre a esperança e o desespero.
Itália do século XVI: muitas mulheres eram forçadas a ingressar numa vida dominada, em todos os aspectos, pela doutrina cristã; quer fosse por o dote a pagar por um casamento ser demasiado elevado para os pais ou devido a deficiências/deformidades que as excluíam desapiedadamente do panorama matrimonial. Enclausuradas dentro dos muros de um convento, poucas soluções haveria para além de ceder a uma espécie de loucura sagrada.

O pai de Serafina teria certamente dinheiro para pagar o dote. E ela não possuía nenhuma deformidade, bem pelo contrário…mas o seu coração entregou-se, cedo demais, ao homem errado…Desespero, fúria, dor. O pânico da constatação de todo um futuro encarcerado. De Sonhos destruídos…«(…) todas as pessoas que amava estavam longe, deixando-a à mercê de um exército de gárgulas, todas tão entupidas de devoção que já não se lembram de como é ser uma mulher vida, com sangue nas veias.»

Gostei da originalidade que acompanha todo o livro e vibrei imenso com a sua imprevisibilidade - o início é de facto confuso devido à introdução de tantas personagens mas depressa lhe apanhamos o ritmo. A descrição da vida no convento é muito interessante e curiosa; os problemas que se podem formar, as estritas regras e a sua aplicação ou as consequências da sua transgressão, a convivência entre tantas mulheres de fé, os jogos e os interesses por detrás das mais inocentes acções, os interesses políticos da Igreja…e o vazio…
A exposição dos conhecimentos médicos e científicos da altura, a forma como eram misturados com crendices e superstição, também é muito curiosa e mantém o interesse vívido na leitura apesar do lento desenvolvimento da trama no geral.
A componente romântica está demasiado ausente mas as personagens estão bem caracterizadas e rapidamente as conseguimos distinguir na sua individualidade. São também bastante interessantes dentro do seu contexto (são freiras…esperar que não fossem mortiças e insonsas era remar completamente contra a credulidade do livro).
A escrita é suave, agradável e melancólica. Infelizmente é também um pouco apagada e esse é o principal ponto negativo, para mim, deste livro. Uma descrição mais pormenorizada do cenário envolvente teria sido bem-vinda, tal como uma melhor clarificação sobre a sociedade italiana da época. Mas nada disso invalida o interesse inato de um argumento como o de «Corações Sagrados».

[J.S. Dunn · Rating 3 out of 5]

For some reason, not as engrossing as some of her other titles in Renaissance Italy. The religiosity seems overthetop and not entirely sincere.

Part of the middling rating also comes from gross lapses in research. First , there is a reference to the abbess having a mahogany armchair. That is very premature for use of mahogany in furniture, and in a small Italian city. Also convent furnishings would not lend themselves to use of mahogany....The error would have repeated itself in a page or two but the next time the reader encounters the armchair it is 'walnut' so add careless proofing by the Big Publisher.

A second instance of faulty research is a reference to vanilla on the convent's cooking wishlist. Again, very premature for use of vanilla, and it doesn't really fit with Italian pastries, and, even today is expensive. Typos/proofing errors also occur, as in scrambling two words: do to rather than to do.

If these repeated complaints and snark about basic quality do anything, let us hope that readers will stop bashing small/indie/DIY titles for errors, typos, and the like, when in fact the Big Phat Publishers who have *allegedly* lavished time, money, and attention on a title commit the same crappy mistakes.

[Deirdre · Rating 5 out of 5]

This richly layered historical narrative provided a fascinating glimpse into an often-overlooked facet of Renaissance life. Serafina is willful, passionate and adamantly unwilling to accept her fate and a life in the convent. While she plots her escape and creates a web of deception that only her advisor Zuana can penetrate, the rest of the convent struggles to reconcile her presence and her rebellion with the potential for glory that her renowned singing voice might bring them. At the same time the abbess seeks desperately to remain a convent apart while the greater church invokes new restrictions on the tiny luxuries the nuns still enjoy.

I was engaged and invested while reading this book - at first I was thoroughly on Serafina's side; as the story wore on, I felt more and more for Zuana and her own struggles. By the end of this complex retelling of a star-crossed lovers tale, I was both happy with the outcome and extraordinarily sad for all of the women involved. I give Dunant and Sacred Hearts five stars and highly recommend it as an intense and thought-provoking read.