Living With Saints Author:Mary O'Connell Mary O'Connell's literary territory owes as much to the pop icon Madonna as it does to the Virgin Mary. Adventurous in subject and spirit, and alternately playful and intense, each story in Living with Saints features a female saint whose life story is thematically woven into deeply resonant contemporary settings. O'Connell's tone is sassy and o... more »ften profane, and in exploring the elements and effects of Catholicism in women's lives, she demonstrates an insider's nuanced understanding of its rich traditions even as she questions their limitations. In one story, the sass-talking Saint Agnes, Patron Saint of Girls, delivers a disembodied running commentary to a high school class that is being subjected to a video called How Christian Girls Blossom into Maturity. In another, Saint Anne, Patron Saint of Mothers, sits on the corner of a bed offering words of wisdom while a woman has sex with her reptilian boss in exchange for time off to be with her baby. From grave illness to the mystery of a virgin pregnancy to the more quotidian heartbreak of balancing work and motherhood, Living with Saints maintains a buoyant freshness that transforms its moments of potential despair. Reminiscent of Jeffrey Eugenides' The Virgin Suicides in its arresting immediacy and of Angela Carter's The Bloody Chamber in its brilliant reinvention of tales of old through the prism of the author's modern voice, Living with Saints is a savvy, insouciant collection of stories that will captivate readers of all or no faiths for years to come.« less