The Passion of Mary Magdalen  | Magdalen Rising  |  Bright Dark Madonna   |  the author  

contact | Mary Magdalen factoids  |  The Maeve Chronicles  |  readers' room press room 

Please join Elizabeth's facebook fan group | BDM - FAN MAIL

 

REVIEWS & PRAISE for Bright Dark Madonna
 

 
5.0 out of 5 stars An outstanding and superbly written series, July 10, 2009

A superbly written historical novel by a master storyteller, Elizabeth Cunningham's 474-page novel "Bright Dark Madonna" is the tale of Maeve, a young pregnant woman who played an intimate role in the mystery of the Resurrection as the Celtic Mary Magdalen. A great controversy breaks out when Maeve seeks to preach the gospel in her own manner, giving voice to her own ideas about how to raise the daughter that Jesus of Nazareth sired with her prior to his execution on a cross by the Romans at the behest of the Jewish religious authorities. When she returns to Temple Magdalen (a holy whorehouse she founded), a custody battle breaks out over her infant daughter Sarah and Jesus' mother must flee to the remote Taurus Mountains to living in hiding among the Galatians. There is where a mysterious stranger shows up on her door step badly in need of her healing. As Maeve determines to keep her family's secret she must also deal with her now adolescent daughter's anger, strength of will, and determination to learn the truth about her father. The legions of readers who so fully enjoyed and appreciated Elizabeth Cunningham's previous two titles in the Mary Magdalene trilogy, "The Maeve Chronicles" will be equally enthralled with the further adventures of Mary Magdalene in "Bright Dark Madonna" as the journey of Maeve and her daughter Sarah continue and conclude with the third and last volume in this outstanding and superbly written series.

 

MORE MEREDITH GOULD (Because I always have more to say): Elizabeth Cunningham's novels about Mary Magdalene (The Maeve Chronicles) seem to either delight or scandalize readers. Count me as one of the delighted. See full review

CLICK HERE FOR: Huffington Post, Susan Corso's review

Pilgrim for the Muse
Meeting the Goddess Face to Face with Novelist Elizabeth Cunningham
by Cait Johnson
When most people get back from abroad, they usually have photos to show of scenic vistas, exotic meals, local color. But when Elizabeth Cunningham, author of the acclaimed Maeve Chronicles, travels, she's searching for stories, making a pilgrimage for the muse.See full review

"Gleefully iconoclastic.  Maeve’s profane skewering of the all-too-human foibles of the Church fathers is a hoot." -Kirkus Review. See full review
 

"Even if you haven't read Elizabeth Cunningham’s previous novels in the Maeve ChroniclesBright Dark Madonna is a compelling story that can stand on its own merits." See full MySelf review

Review from Historical Novels Review

FROM BOOKLIST: Having brought Jesus back to life à la Isis reviving Osiris, Maeve, the Celtic Magdalen, suffers early-pregnancy nausea as this volume of Cunningham’s four-part series opens. Thus inconvenienced, she misses Pentecost—par for the course for Maeve, who not only turns up in the wrong place at the wrong time but also is a no-show at the centers of power when the Christian story is articulated for the ages. Which is why we don’t know about her and Jesus’ daughter, the Amazonian pirate Sarah. Or about how she lived among the Galatians with Jesus’ mother, Mary, whom she later escorted to Ephesus to learn how to become a mother-goddess from the great Artemis. Or how she saved Paul of Tarsus from death, only to have her daughter stolen by him. As usual, Cunningham provides plenty of juicy controversy embodied by vivid characters and expressed in vigorous action, all in crisply drawn biblical settings. As the book ends, Maeve turns her eyes back to the Celtic world that birthed her for a dramatic conclusion to her adventures. —Patricia Monaghan

At last—Elizabeth’s Celtic Mary Magdalen has a close encounter with Paul of Tarsus … -Foreword Magazine. See full review

 

WAMC interview with Joe Donahue

 

FAN MAIL for Bright Dark Madonna

The Passion of Mary Magdalen  | Magdalen Rising  |  Bright Dark Madonna   |  the author  

contact | Mary Magdalen factoids  |  The Maeve Chronicles  |  readers' room press room