The Passion of Mary Magdalen: A Novel (Maeve Chronicles)
*Starred Review* Anyone not ensconced in a cave lately has heard the rumor that Mary Magdalene was literally the bride of Christ.The Da VinciCode (2003) popularized the theory sufficiently to make Magdalene pilgrimages big business in France, where she ostensibly established the French royal family. Magdalene fans are in for more surprises in Cunningham's classy, sexy novel, which embraces the Magdalene's reputation for prostitution to the extent of casting her as a sacred whore serving the goddess Isis. For Cunningham, Mary is Maeve, a big, strapping, redheaded Celt sold into slavery in Rome and bought for her ample charms by a renowneddomina(i.e., madam). Cunningham's big book is first an absorbing historical novel about down-and-dirty slave life in Rome and then a visionary fantasy about the Magdalene's life as Jesus' gentile wife. Besides Maeve's endearingly slutty second owner, Paulina, few characters participate in both, but in both are characters well known from other texts; for example, in the first the king of the "golden bough," in the second the Virgin Mary, who, holy though she is, is also quite dotty. Cunningham's wild, breakneck style only cements the suspicion that this will be--besides snapped up by Magdalene fans, Celtophiles, feminists, and lovers of a good yarn--controversial. Those unready for lesbianismandsex with the Redeemer between the same covers may blanch as well as flush.Patricia MonaghanCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved