The
Island of Mists and Miracles by Victoria Mas was translated from French
by Frank Wynne:
This short novel opens in the 1830s with a young novice in the order of the Sisters of Charity seeing a vision of the Virgin Mary. And then the action moves to the present day, with an elderly nun waiting for the arrival of an assistant from the same order to help her with her work in Brittany.
As Sister Delphine waits for the bus in the port of Roscoff, she smokes a cigarette and prays that her new companion will be neither a prude nor a prig.
At first sight, Sister Anne is neither. But what Sister Delphine doesn’t know is that Sister Anne has come to Brittany because she believes she has been told this is the place where she will have a vision similar to the one from a previous century.
Meanwhile, on a small island, off the coast of Roscoff, two troubled teenagers are struggling to come to terms with their lives in a small and claustrophobic community, where too many people have unresolved issues.
One of the boys, Isaac, is living with his father who has sunk into depression as he mourns the death of his wife. Isaac only gets comfort from Madenn who runs the local café. Hugo is the middle child of a family where the older son who is away with the army is regarded as a hero and a success, and the parents’ attention is focused on Hugo’s sickly little sister. His father seems to despise him and his interests. The two boys know each other, but are not really friends.
Then, one day, Isaac sees something that he cannot articulate, and that he alone can see. Did he have a vision? Is he a hoaxer? Is it all a portent of something else? No-one can be sure, but emotions among the locals are stirred to boiling point. Has a miracle occurred, and if so, why to Isaac rather than to anyone else – particularly to Sister Anne, who was expecting it?
Events move swiftly to a disturbing and violent climax. The novel offers no clear-cut answers as to what has happened, perhaps partly because the characters themselves are all somewhat opaque. Suffice it to say that none of them will emerge unscathed or with their beliefs intact. As one of the characters says at the end: “It happened because it happened. That’s all there is to it.” Whether that makes for a satisfying piece of fiction is another question. - Margaret von Klemperer
The Island of Mists and Miracles is published by Doubleday: ISBN 978-0-8575-2937-
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