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i bought Ann Rinaldi's The Staircase because it had a charming theme: New Mexico, 1878 and the building of the miraculous staircase at Loretto. the premise on the back described it as an adventure of a young methodist girl in a convent school of the foreign world of Catholicism and the miracle, etc. blah blah blah. i thought: nice! a young girl outside the faith is exposed to a miracle and maybe reevaluates her prejudices against the Church.
think again! this tired piece of stereotyping drivel was a sore disappointment to be sure.
a catalog of its offenses:
1. even in 1878 girls will be girls apparently. the academy girls in this case have no actual faith whatsoever and seem to spend all their time and energy sneaking out at night to smoke cigarettes and meet boys (um ~ no). i'm not exaggerating either: not a single girl in this school is serious.
2. the most offensive character in the story is one of these girls who is not only a hateful little witch, but goes so far to manipulate her uncle the bishop, claim to have a vocation to be a nun so she can carry on with a boy, and she stabs the eyes out of a kitten with an embroidery needle (i'm not making this up).
3. the only admirable, not hateful characters are the non-Catholics and nuns who break all the rules and the carpenter of the staircase, of course, who spouts such relativist gems as : God doesn't care what faith you are as long as you're a good person. the bishop is shown to be nice, but also removed from the faith.
4. as to the Faith: oy vey! just a pack of superstitious idol-worshipping idiocy. the novena to Saint Joseph in particular is so abused by the plot to make you think Catholics are morons ~ it's really pathetic.
5. the story itself is just idiotic: characters are so broad-brushed they're like cartoons and most of them do completely illogical things just for the sake of moving the plot forward. when the usefulness of a character has run out, the author just kills them off conveniently. at the end we're supposed to believe that the horrid girl who blinded the cat is somehow redeemed because the carpenter heals the cat, but where the author pulls this from is beyond me ~ the girl never shows the slightest remorse or change.
who'd've thunk in this glorious "enlightened" day and age such a nasty, hateful book would get published? and for a young audience as well! here kiddies, something to galvanize your hatred of the Church. if this had been written about a black school or buddhist retreat or pretty much anything else, it would have never gotten by the editor. blargh!
i'm now reading David Guterson's Our Lady of the Forest ~ let's see if it's any better in its treatment of the Faith.
: o p
think again! this tired piece of stereotyping drivel was a sore disappointment to be sure.
a catalog of its offenses:
1. even in 1878 girls will be girls apparently. the academy girls in this case have no actual faith whatsoever and seem to spend all their time and energy sneaking out at night to smoke cigarettes and meet boys (um ~ no). i'm not exaggerating either: not a single girl in this school is serious.
2. the most offensive character in the story is one of these girls who is not only a hateful little witch, but goes so far to manipulate her uncle the bishop, claim to have a vocation to be a nun so she can carry on with a boy, and she stabs the eyes out of a kitten with an embroidery needle (i'm not making this up).
3. the only admirable, not hateful characters are the non-Catholics and nuns who break all the rules and the carpenter of the staircase, of course, who spouts such relativist gems as : God doesn't care what faith you are as long as you're a good person. the bishop is shown to be nice, but also removed from the faith.
4. as to the Faith: oy vey! just a pack of superstitious idol-worshipping idiocy. the novena to Saint Joseph in particular is so abused by the plot to make you think Catholics are morons ~ it's really pathetic.
5. the story itself is just idiotic: characters are so broad-brushed they're like cartoons and most of them do completely illogical things just for the sake of moving the plot forward. when the usefulness of a character has run out, the author just kills them off conveniently. at the end we're supposed to believe that the horrid girl who blinded the cat is somehow redeemed because the carpenter heals the cat, but where the author pulls this from is beyond me ~ the girl never shows the slightest remorse or change.
who'd've thunk in this glorious "enlightened" day and age such a nasty, hateful book would get published? and for a young audience as well! here kiddies, something to galvanize your hatred of the Church. if this had been written about a black school or buddhist retreat or pretty much anything else, it would have never gotten by the editor. blargh!
i'm now reading David Guterson's Our Lady of the Forest ~ let's see if it's any better in its treatment of the Faith.
: o p
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