THE PATRON SAINT OF BUTTERFLIES
Cecilia Galante
Bloomsbury USA Children’s Books
Fiction
Hardcover: 9781599903776
Paperback: 9781599903774
320 pages

Mount Blessing is a secluded commune near Fairfield, Connecticut, and home to about 260 people. Emmanuel, the founder of the commune, leads them in all areas of life. Most of the inhabitants hold him in the highest regard, only one tiny step below Jesus. They trust him to lead them in spiritual lives, and he does so in a strict, perfectionist way --- no television or radios, chanting prayers many hours a day, and restriction to the Mount Blessing grounds, except for the ones who have jobs to earn money for the commune. Emmanuel also handles the discipline.

Fourteen-year-olds Honey and Agnes have lived their entire lives at Mount Blessing. Every child there leaves his or her parents at six months of age and moves to the nursery until the age of seven or so. Then he or she returns to live with mom and dad. Except for Honey. Her father is a complete question mark, and her mother left the commune when Honey was just three weeks old. The only item her mom left behind was a tiny ceramic cat, which Honey carries with her all the time.

Honey and Agnes have been best friends since the cradle. At least up until recently. When Agnes turns 12, Emmanuel presents her with a special book, THE SAINTS’ WAY. After that, Agnes strives desperately for perfection and sainthood. She even performs self-mutilation in penance for her mistakes, like starvation (she calls fasting), sleeping on rocks, and tying a string around her waist to cut into her skin. Agnes feels that Mount Blessing is a sacred place and a special home.

Honey, on the other hand, desperately dreams of freedom from Mount Blessing’s rigid rules. She sneaks glimpses of the outside world from the tiny black and white TV that her housemate, Winky, a physically and mentally challenged gardener, hides under his bed to secretly watch baseball games. The only happiness Honey finds is helping Winky in the butterfly gardens, her friendship with Agnes before she began straining for sainthood, and the yearly visit of Nana Pete.

Nana Pete is grandmother to Agnes and her little brother Benny, but has always included Honey in everything. She comes for yearly visits, and the three kids enjoy their time with her. However, this year Nana Pete finally learns about Emmanuel’s harsh discipline, and she refuses to allow the child abuse to continue. A life-threatening accident offers the opportunity to yank Agnes, Benny and Honey away from the commune. While Honey loves exploring the outside world’s freedom, Agnes pleads to return to Mount Blessing. In the frantic chaos that follows their escape, the group of scarred and hurting spirits discovers a few deeply buried secrets.

THE PATRON SAINT OF BUTTERFLIES is Cecilia Galante’s debut novel --- and what a truly special, amazing, heart-touching work of art it is! Galante offers a glimpse into one commune’s routines, a commune housing people who are so desperate to believe in something, anything, that their clouded judgment refuses to see the truth hiding beneath the fancy words. The story pulls readers through the pages with a persistent urgency to discover what happens to the two main characters. Told in alternating points of view, switching chapters for Agnes and Honey, readers get to see the different effects of this particular commune up close and personal. Galante is a very talented writer, and fans will eagerly look forward to her next book.

    --- Reviewed by Chris Shanley-Dillman, author of FINDING MY LIGHT and THE BLACK POND

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