The nun’s story

Saga of three students and buried secrets in a Catholic girls school

January 24, 2010|Valerie Miner, Globe Correspondent

Gail Godwin’s 13th novel, “Unfinished Desires,’’ is a large, roomy story of love, loss, fidelity, secrets, rivalry, and faith in the lives of a charming, flawed troupe of characters. Godwin masterfully evokes a Catholic girlhood in the 20th century through the lens of Mount St. Gabriel’s, a girls school in the North Carolina mountains. You smell the incense, taste the host sticking to the roof of your mouth, hear the haunting Latin hymns, and recall a time when the world seemed more simply divided - between Catholics and non-Catholics.

Friendship, snobbery, passion, and ambition complicate the practice of religion by students and nuns alike. Godwin covers a lot of history - describing the school’s founder, Mother Elizabeth Wallingford, 1863-1930, as well as the lives of septuagenarian alumnae in 2008. Her narrative is primarily divided between a chronicle of the eventful 1951-1952 school year and the 2001 memoir being written by 85-year-old Mother Suzanne Ravenel.

Mount St. Gabriel’s is a refuge to the young Suzanne Ravenel, escaping an unloving Savannah home. At the age of 16, she precipitously enters the convent. Since then, she has been a dedicated, if conflicted, servant of God, her students, and her order. Godwin’s three other characters are freshmen Tildy Stratton, Maud Norton, and Chloe Starnes. “Unfinished Desires’’ is an album overflowing with snapshots - some with contradictory captions - documenting the lives of Catholic girls and women.

Suzanne Ravenel is a dynamo. Since student days, she’s been vigorous, brilliant, and driven. “Why did it act as a stimulant when someone admitted to having less of something than you did. Perhaps because God made us to be competitive.’’

For most of the story she hides from a secret indiscretion. During the pivotal year, 1951-1952, naïve Tildy Stratton threatens to reveal the secret. Tildy is awed and exasperated by single-minded Mother Ravenel, a 36-year-old school director with the commanding presence of a 70-year-old cardinal.