The Singular Pilgrim; Travels on Sacred Ground

“Selected as a Notable Book of the Year by both The San Francisco Chronicle and The Christian Science Monitor, The Singular Pilgrim is a riveting account of one woman's personal quest to find the root of belief among modern religious pilgrims. The intrepid Rosemary Mahoney undertakes six extraordinary journeys: visiting an Anglican shrine to Saint Mary in Walsingham, England; walking the five-hundred-mile Camino de Santiago in northern Spain; braving the icy bathwater at Lourdes; rowing alone across the Sea of Galilee to spend a night camped below the Golan Heights; viewing Varanasi, India's holiest city, from a rubber raft on the Ganges; soldiering barefoot through the three-day penitential Catholic pilgrimage on Ireland's Station Island. A fiercely observant traveler and an insightful writer, Mahoney offers a witty and provocative chronicle of her adventures.”

Reviews

“Mahoney once again proves both resourceful and fearless . . . [She] worries that her sharp tongue and short temper make her an unfit pilgrim . . . but these are also the qualities that make this such a bracing and pleasurable book.” --The New York Times Book Review

“A pilgrimage about pilgrims and holy places that is not only enlightening but also very funny.” --Paul Theroux

“For all the emotional intensity and spiritual probing of this book, it is also full of humor and high adventure. Mahoney's sharp eye for the profane, the worldly, and the foolish intrudes at every turn, often to great comic effect. And her ear for language, whether the Gaelic-influenced cadences of St. Patrick's or the Indian English at Varanasi, gives rise to some hilarious dialogue and vivid portraits . . . Equal parts serious inquiry and irrepressible humor at the human condition, this is a book to be treasured by spiritual seekers and armchair adventurers alike.” --The Christian Science Monitor

“The great twin pleasures here for readers are [Mahoney’s] sharp vision and prose that matches it . . . She sketches her fellow pilgrims and herself unsparingly, finds grace in unadvertized quarters, finds humor remarkably often.” --The Los Angeles Times Book Review

“As an observer, Mahoney has an ublinking eye . . . She has a poet’s gift for striking images.” --The Washington Post Book World

“Mahoney is a fine writer . . . She carefully avoids making The Singular Pilgrim too much of a ‘spiritual awakening through travel’ tale. IN fact, her doubt and questioning remain intact to the end.”... --The San Francisco Chronicle

“Sometimes purposeful, sometimes footloose, the act of undertaking a pilgrimage is "both a preparation for death and a hedge against it." So writes Rosemary Mahoney, who knows well whereof she speaks. A reluctant churchgoer, and less interested in religion per se than in the faith that underlies it, she travels in this absorbing narrative to some of the world’s great pilgrimage sites: Ireland’s Croagh Patrick, Lourdes, Santiago de Compostela, Canterbury, the banks of the Ganges. "As I got into the rhythm of it," she writes, "I found that the more I walked, the more I wanted to walk." Walk she does, over hundreds of miles, observing and recording along the way, talking with ascetics and skeptics, joining the multitude whose physical beings wander in order that their minds might turn toward the divine . . . Fans of travel narratives and religious memoirs alike will find much pleasure, and much on which to reflect, in Mahoney’s pages.” --Amazon.com

“In this reflection on her experiences in Christian and Hindu holy places, the critically acclaimed author of previous books on Lillian Hellman and Ireland is deeply skeptical, occasionally biting and sporadically hopeful about the possibility that a transcendent God might exist . . . Readers seeking small marvels, instead of life-changing miracles, will find this a provocative and illuminating armchair adventure.” --Publisher’s Weekly “Cutting through the preciousness and self-importance of many modern-day pilgrimages, she weaves a fascinating tapestry of discoveries.” --Booklist