Music for Spring 2026: Caatrin Finch; Boiled in Lead; Breabach; American MIle; Hallie Grace; Clayton Chaney; Michael Rudd

What could be better than spring and new music releases, including a few Celtic gems?

Catrin Finch hails from Wales, a place that knows a few things about great harp music. Her new Notes to Self has an interesting hook. She uses the prompt of writing letters to herself when she was 13 and went by “Katy,” then transposes the feel of those notes into music for an all-instrumental album. Finch is 45 now, and has learned a few tricks along her path. For instance, many of the tracks use repeating musical patterns topped by bass lines, and looping. There are, at once, memorable melodies and an intimate feel. “13 opens as if a teen is practicing her lessons, but quickly shifts to her mature side in which the strings ring like bells amidst quieter secondary melodies.  Call it where force meets airiness. The video for second single “Kin” takes this a step further. In a girl-is-the-mother-of-the-woman sweep we see footage of Finch as a child practicing before cutting to her as an adult playing “Kin.” The music is majestic with lullaby-like contrast , but we can see her having some fun. (Check out the sneakers!)  She’s more formal on “Clear Sky,” though its ringing strings could also evoke a gentle rain. Most of the record is on the formal side, but “Black Holes” is… well, it’s hard to say. Soundscaping for sure, but with enough structure to make it more than random.  Put simply, Ms. Finch simply commands her instrument.

 

 

 

Does the band Boiled in Lead ring any bells? This Minneapolis-based quartet has been around since 1983, generally (but not always) as either a punk band or some sort of Celtic outfit (Celtic rock/punk/post-punk/world music, etc.). Bass player Drew Miller is the only original member in a band that has changed styles and personnel to follow the direction the musical winds are blowing. Their punk roots notwithstanding, the Boiled in Lead moniker comes from a version of the folk standard “The Two Sisters” as interpreted by Clannad, that gentlest of plugged-in Celts. At one point, BIL was seen as America’s answer to Fairport Convention and Steeleye Span. Later they drew comparisons to Hüsker Dü and more lately to Gogol Bordello.  On King of the Dogwoods BIL opts for a more subdued sound. Former lead vocalist Todd Menton has rejoined the band, Mo Engel now pounds the drums, and Haley Olson Miller plays a fiery fiddle. The song “King of the Dogwoods” does have a bit of early Steeleye vibe, though the song itself is somewhere along the musical spectrum between bluegrass and Goth. It’s about movie monsters and the things that perhaps lurk in the dark woods. Its very ambiguity is a step back from creepy. “Je t’Aime, Helena’’ sounds like something swampy from the bayou. They go full rock and reel on “Haley’s,” but what do you want to do with “Bucimis,” which is Bulgarian for both a folk dance and poison hemlock. It’s more a headbangers' dance than village fa-de-da, though one could imagine a poisoning. There are others built around folk melodies. So, what kind of band in BIL? The word eclectic comes to mind on an album with more variety than Jimmy Fallon.

 

 

I recently saw the Scottish band Breabach in concert and picked up their latest recording, Fás, a Scots Gaelic word that means rejuvenation, sprouting, or growth. The CD is from 2022, but it wasn’t yet part of my collection. I will go on record as saying they are far more exciting live than in the studio, but the song "Fás" is a good way to introduce yourself to a band whose Gaelic name translates “bouncy.” Breabach (bray’-ah-bak) will bounce you right out of your seat when both Calum MacCrimmon and Conal McDonagh put down their Celtic whistles and heft the Highland pipes. “The Old Collection” is a lively tune that shows how the band balance the pipes with normally quieter instruments such as fiddle, guitar, and double bass. The melody and song leads come from the husband/wife team of Ewan Robertson (guitar) and Megan Henderson (fiddle), which Henderson picking up most of the Gaelic-language offerings such as “Fàs” or “Eadar an DàBhràigh” (“Between the two braes), the latter on which she warbles like a fragile bird. “John Mackenzie’s March” is a lovely tune and song about loss. Breabach might not yet have the stature of classic bands like Silly Wizard, the Tannahill Weavers, or Ossian, but they’re getting there! Side Note: When I visited Orkney a few years ago I met Megan's brother and uncle!

 

To move away from Celtic, fans of Southern and country rock should sample American Mile and their album American Dream. “Straight from the Heartland” might make you think these guys are Bread Basket-born, what with talk of dusty roads, a beat-up truck, and a “worn-down home,” but they are based in Los Angeles. Lead singers Eugene Rice and Joe Perez belt out gritty songs and have voices made for arena rock, which is no doubt why they draw comparisons to both Aerosmith and Tom Petty. “Hard Workin’ People” has a soulful, funky feel to a song that celebrates the working class and an appreciation for their challenges. “TuffLivin’” is more of the same message, but their live version is dynamite: two electric lead guitars, bass, and a full drum kit. They’re plugged in, loud, and American Mile has stories to sing about.

 

 

Hallie Grace is an Indie-pop singer, so naturally she gets compared to Taylor Swift, Maggie Rogers, Sara Bareilles, etc.  I suppose that’s inevitable when: (a) she has just released her first full-length album Motivation, and (b) she plays piano as do those better-known figures. Nonetheless, it’s ironic for someone with a song titled “Imma Just Do Me” Motivation contains 11 tracks that investigate life’s ups and downs and what to do when the second of those arise. She should know; she’s had quite a few herself. Grace, now based in Charlotte, is the kind of artist who appeals to Millennials and Zoomers, peppy, kind of sassy, and confident of her abilities. “Vice” has dance grooves but I was more impressed by Grace’s balance of lower, darker tones and her birdlike highs. “Her Fight Remains” is a look at battling disease, especially Epidermolysis Bullosa skin disorder (sometimes called “butterfly skin”). Grace tends to go vocally from gentle to strong. Sometimes the production on her full-tilt vocals comes off as overproduced, but it’s hard to deny that she has a great set of pipes. “When the Rain Falls” reminds me of Patty Griffin and given my enthusiasm for Ms. Griffin consider that’s high praise. 

 

 

Clayton Chaney recently dropped the single, “When the Light Comes In” from his new recording Too Far. It’s a musing on love and religion, but the title alone could be his theme song. He left Arkansas for Los Angeles at age 18, and put performers like Roger Miller aside for meatier material from bands like Dawes. Chaney has a big voice and a fondness for flamboyance. After all, he has a song titled “Something About Los Angeles.” It’s a country-folk song as well, but somehow California country sounds different. It’s cleaner production-wise for one thing, in-the-studio kind of way. I’m fond of title track, “Too Far,” which is about dreams that don't come true, yet has a hopeful edge. Call is stripped down country acoustic that wears its honesty on the guitar stock. It has a homespun feel that hits you like a freight train after some of the glitz wears away. “Roots Grow Deep” has a similar feel and, man, can this dude stretch his voice.

 

 

 

Folks in Western Massachusetts may remember Michael Rudd, who lived here for a time after leaving New Jersey. He lit off for the West and now lives in New Mexico, a place that can stun with its beauty and make you weep over its poverty. He was the principal of a K-8 school at Acoma Pueblo, which has been occupied for over 900 years yet has a poverty rate of around 24 percent. Rudd went back to music after hearing songs in his head; his third studio album Ways of the World samples some of them. It’s an often poetic album that examines the human condition by digging deeper and pondering transcendence rather than the quotidian. If you know New Mexico, a song like “Water” resonates, though Rudd’s deep voice takes us to the depths of the soul. “On My Way”oozes darkness, but again in a contemplative way. Rudd uses strong baritone to sing the blues, bring us down, and lift us up. One example is “There’s a Rainbow in Your Mind.” There’s a rainbow in your mind/You got thunder in your shoes… You got nothing, left to lose. If you want bluesy Americana at a faster tempo try “Not Today.”

 

Rob Weir

 

 

Not Today:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lF844OsFF6k&list=RDlF844OsFF6k&start_radio=1

Poignant Short Stories from Claire Keegan

  

So Late in the Day: stories of women and men [sic on lower case]

By Claire Keegan

Grove Press, 2023, 118 pages

★★★★★

 

Some have hailed Claire Keegan as the greatest living Irish writer. I would not care to dispute it. So Late in the Day is three short stories that can be read in a quiet room in less than hour, but will stay with you for days. As the subtitle suggests, they feature the interactions between women and men, but they are merely the protagonists, not what the tales are about.

 

Irish fiction is often sad. The title tale is about Cathal, who does boring work that reflects his boring life. As he is about to go to his home in County Wicklow just south of Dublin, he realizes he forgot to save the financial document upon which he was working. Only a Polish cleaning lady that he dislikes is still around when he finally leaves. I reckon many of us have made such a careless mistake, but in Cathal’s case it’s indicative of a pattern. The story is really about how non-thinking carried into a relationship can be deadly. On the bus home he thinks of his almost-wife Sabine. Just a year earlier they were engaged, but his thoughtless disregard and inflexibility sent her packing back to Normandy. She also took his spirit with her and Cathal has now become the callous misogynist bloke he always hated.

 

In “The Long Painful Death,” Cynthia is lucky to be on Achill Island for a two-week writers’ retreat. She is staying in a home where the Nobel Prize-winning author Heinrich Böll once stayed, but she has a touch of writer’s block and has easily settled into the island’s slower pace. That is, until her lethargy is interrupted by an insistent German man who has been told he can see the house. First, he comes without notice when Cynthia isn’t ready, then he returns and criticizes her work habits. His arrogance is palpable but at least Cynthia knows how she will end her novel!

 

The concluding story, “Antarctica,” is the creepiest of the three. It involves a married woman with three kids who tells her family she is going Christmas shopping. In truth, she intends to trawl the city to find a man with whom she can have sex. She’s not unhappy in her marriage, she’s merely curious about what it would be like. She finds a guy who is a fantastic lover, but you certainly don’t need me to tell you about the potential dangers of having sex with a stranger.

 

If everyone could write short stories like Claire Keegan, I’d be a much bigger fan of the genre. I find far too many short stories either oblique or so obsessed with style that the narratives fail to spark. Keegan writes crisp prose that sharpens serious subjects such as anomie, fears of violence, and both physical and emotional isolation. In her worldview, a lack of consideration is a form of carelessness that yields unintended results on the tragedy scale. Her view of Irish men is pretty bleak and I suppose she could be accused of misandry. Or, you could call it turnabout is fair play. Your choice.

 

Rob Weir

 

Note: Achill Island is off the western coast of Ireland across from County Mayo. It has long been associated with writers and artists. The island is also associated with Grace O’Malley, a famous Irish female pirate. Confession: I have never read a word of Heinrich Böll.

The Christophers a (near) Masterpiece

 

 

THE CHRISTOPHERS (2025)

Directed by Steven Soderbergh

Neon Films, 100 minutes, R (for language)

★★★★ ½

 

There are more than two actors in The Christophers, but it’s really a pas de deux between Ian McKellen and Michaela Coel. This amazing British film sees director Steven Soderbergh turn in one of his most stellar efforts is quite a few years if, for no other reason, he allowed his actors to act with minimal interference.

 The film’s premise is deceptively simple. Two greedy siblings of famed cantankerous artist Julian Sklar (McKellen), Barnaby (James Corden) and Sallie (Jessica Gunning), are trying to get a jump start of their hoped-for inheritance. Julian was unapologetically bisexual, though his most passionate affair involved his gay lover, Christoper. He painted two series of Christopher portraits that wowed the art world and sold for fortunes in the 1990s.

 As Julian aged, though, his star waned, sales dried up, and now spends his days lounging about in his dressing robe, complaining about taxes–though he hasn’t actually paid property taxes in years–and belittling what he sees as the lack of talent of current popular artists. Barnaby and Sallie know there is a third set of Christopher canvases in the attic of his ramshackle London home that he has vowed never to finish. If they can get their hands on the Christophers and hire a forger to “finish” them, they can pay off debts as soon as their dying old man kicks the paint bucket. Alas for them, the only thing Julian despises more than taxes, his failing body, and other artists, it’s his shallow children.

Barnaby and Sallie turn to a former art school friend, Lori Butler (Coel) to “finish” the third set as she knows Julian’s work well and has worked as a legitimate commercial copyist of famous photos. (Think the person who paints the Monets, Vermeers, and Van Goghs that hang above the sofas of people who could never afford original masterpieces.) Lori doesn’t want any part of their scheming and she doesn’t particularly like the money-grubbing Sklar children either, but her own art career is in the doldrums and she needs money. (Not-so-) dear old dad is talked into hiring an assistant to help catalog his work and suggest Lori as an appropriate candidate. The “interview” consists of Sklar’s uninterruptible monologue of his own genius, venomous rants, and, we suspect, his realization that his offspring’s plotting is as obvious as a severed head on a pike. Lori’s first assignment is to destroy the Christophers in the attic, though Lori copies what Julian has done and destroys the copies while hiding the originals.

 Julian doesn’t fall for that dodge, fires Lori, and unleashes a tirade about her unworthiness to even attempt to duplicate his work. He also tells her that he might be old and dying, but he knows how to use Google and that her own work is awful. Lori fully admits her culpability, but as she is leaving, she delivers a learned dissection of why his second series of Christopher was inferior to the first. Julian has a change of heart, shows up at her apartment, and is stunned by her art when seeing it in person. He rehires her and enlists her help in humbling his children. They decide to make the new Christophers into unmarketable equivalents of Elvis on velvet. Julian attacks the canvas with feathers, glitter, glue, slashes, and thrown paint. To his chagrin, he’s incapable of making bad art! He doesn’t spring the trap right away, but, revenge is a dish best served (when the body’s) cold. 

 

Just sayin' 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 McKellen is among the greatest actors of his generation. He is magnificent in his rants, downright scary in his fury, and never breaks character. (He clearly grows fond of Lori, but do you reckon he’ll show it?) Even when he’s just chewing scenery, McKellen’s so good you’ll beg for seconds. Ms. Coel is nothing short of a revelation. She is British-born, but her parents’ Ghanian features– triangular face, high cheeks, and dark skin–look like Ashanti sculptures, and Coel borrows the ambiguous expressions of such pieces. She sees through Julian like he’s an open window, but hides her insights behind a fiery gaze that dissuades inquisitors. Watching her and McKellen on the screen at the same time is a master class in acting.

 The only thing that mars the film is that the parts of Barnaby and Sallie are underwritten. Though the film is a black comedy, Corden and Gunning are more cartoon-like than they need to be.

 

Rob Weir

 

 

Did the Red Sox Err in Firing Alex Cora?

The answer to the above question is yes. I’m a Yankees fan, but even though Cora is a cheater who cost the Yankees a World Series bid in both 2017 when he skippered the Astros and again in 2018 with the Red Sox, but I’d trade Aaron Boone for Alex Cora any day of the week. What made Cora’s cheating all the more galling is that he’s a very good tactician who doesn’t need to cheat. MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred chose to suspend Cora for the 2020 season. Personally, I believe he and several others who got off scot-free (hello Jose Altuve) damaged the reputation of the game and should have been banned for five years, but that wasn’t what MLB decided.

 

Move the clock forward. Over the weekend the Red Sox fired Cora and six of his coaches. Cheating had nothing to do with it. Red Sox Director of Baseball Operations–a title to Red Sox use instead of General Manager–Craig Breslow made the call. At the time the Red Sox were in last place with a 10-17 record. To paraphrase an old baseball adage, no team on a long winning streak is as good as they look, nor is any as bad as they look when losing. Maybe you fire a good manager toward the end of the year, but Cora was just 27 games into a 162-game season. By my math he had 135 games to right the ship!

 

Exactly who was calling for Cora’s head on a platter? The Red Sox infamously went 86 years (1918-2004) without a World Series championship. Think of it. Some sources will tell you that the Red Sox have won 9 World Series championships, but that’s funny accounting. There was no American League team in Boston until 1901 and they were called the Americans when they won in 1903. They weren’t the Red Sox until 1908, and didn’t play in Fenway Park until 1912. (Note: Early Boston teams called the Bees, the Doves, Red Caps, Red Stockings, Rustlers, and Beaneaters played in the National League and eventually became the Braves.) During the “live ball” era from 1920 on, the Red Sox won zero World Series championships.

 

The Red Sox had considerable success in the dead ball era, but it was not until the 21^st century it mastered the baseball as we know it today. If we think of a World Series title as the ultimate measure of a manager’s worthiness, there are just three Red Sox managers who can boast such success: Terry Francona (2004, 2007), John Farrell (2013), and Alex Cora (2018). Only Joe Cronin (1071 wins in 13 years) and Francona (744) won more games as a Red Sox manager than Cora’s 621 over 8 years. It hasn’t escaped notice that during his 12-year pitching career Breslow was 23-30.

 

What did in Alex Cora? Not another cheating scandal; it was a relative lack of success with a flawed roster and Breslow’s quick trigger as he seeks to shape the team in his own image.  Thus, he handed over the reins to AAA manager Chad Tracey, the theory being that he managed many of the younger Red Sox players in the minors. To repeat a point I’ve made elsewhere, very few MLB teams (over-) hype their prospects like the Red Sox. They gave big contract extensions to several youngsters before they even made the team. Roman Anthony makes sense, but Wilyer Abreu, Brayan Bello, Kristian Campbell, Jarren Duran, Marcello Mayer, and Ceddane Rafaela? Maybe they will become good players but other than flash some good leather, none of them has yet justified a multi-million contract. Whose idea was it to throw $90 million over five years to Masataka Yoshido? Or to trade Rafael Devers, one of the few players on the roster with power? Who thinks that 5’6” Caleb Durbin is the answer at third? Not the Braves, Yankees, or Brewers who had him in their systems.

 

Don’t get me wrong. Payton Tolle and Connelly Early look like legitimate Sox prospects. Nor should anyone think Garrett Crochet will have a 6.30 ERA by the end of the 2026 season.  Or that the Yankees will continue to win at a .643 clip over the next 134 games. The firing of Alex Cora is a portrait of administrative ineptitude, not of Alex Cora’s ability.

 

Rob Weir

Good Ideas: The Wonder of Stars

When I was in grade school, my Aunt Evelyn took me to Philadelphia to see my great Uncle Dave and Aunt Pearl. My visit involved a trip to the Fels Planetarium. I was, so to speak, star-struck! We went into an old building–allegedly the second oldest planetarium in the US–the lights dimmed, and the only things visible was a projector and the only sound was that of our guide. He took us on a journey across the cosmos, which was decidedly smaller than the one we now know. (Only a few galaxies beyond our own, and no Big Bang, quarks, black holes, telescopes in space, or human space flights.) I was enthralled!

I never wanted to be an astronaut, but going to the Fels and perusing my Great Uncle Dave’s entire collection of National Geographic magazines for articles on outer space was an eye opener. At one point I could look into the sky and pick out a few constellations. (Full disclosure: I never did figure out how anyone could imagine Zodiac figures in the stars.) Many years later, my boyhood met my young adulthood. 

 

The Old Fels Planetarium*

 

My college had several courses for non-majors nicknamed “(fill in the black) for Poets.” To qualify for a teaching license, I had to take one called “Basic Physical Science,” that was divided into three four-week graded units: Biology, Physics, and Astronomy. I took the first two in high school, though I was such a right-brained guy that Mr. Science would have renounced me if I were his only son! The Bio part was boring, but I eked out a C. Physics was another matter. I loved the first week of Chem with my hippie/dippy prof, but then disaster hit in the form of an emergency appendectomy. I missed three weeks of school and flat-out flunked Chem. I needed to have at least a C to get credit for the course. Next up, Astronomy. My boyhood enthusiasm was rekindled and I aced it. My transcript has a C+ for the course, but I’m sure I would have gotten a B or B+ if my appendix hadn’t burst.

Forgive the long intro, but I smiled from ear-to-ear when I read about a local middle school program sponsored by the Northampton Education Foundation (NEF) to interest kids in astronomy. It’s a good idea on its own, but NEF contact [sic] Llama Maynard worked with the middle school’s Matt Heaney on a way to bring a Fels Planetarium-like experience to the kids. Who among us does not love a simple solution to a complex problem? Theirs was a pop-up planetarium!

 

Pop-Up Planetarium

 

A what? The idea was an inflatable dome fashioned from black opaque material. Once blown up it looks a bit like a Coleman tent crossed with a flat-bottomed Hostess Snowball. A slit on one side allows students to enter, take a chair, and enjoy a show like mine at the Fels, except it was brought up-to-date. Kids spoke of the excitement of seeing a supernova, learning how galaxies formed, and traveling through Saturn’s rings. They even witnessed a simulation of the Big Bang. Now that’s creative teaching for impressionable young folks.

Who knows what they will carry with them from the experience. An uptick in telescope sales? An obsession with star charts? Future space voyagers? I’m still not going up there until science builds something akin to the Star Trek Enterprise. But if the planetarium experience sticks and inspires some young “poet” to get a good grade in a college science class, the pop-up planetarium will have been a very good idea!

 

Rob Weir

 

* I may be wrong, but I believe the old Fels was abandoned and that the new one is inside of the Franklin Institute.  

 

 

 

Midnight Black: A Guilty Pleasure?

 

 

 

MIDNIGHT BLACK (2025)

By Mark Greaney

Berkley Publishing Group, 528 pages.

★★★

 

As a kid I devoured Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels. They resonated with the Cold War rhetoric that was in vogue back then, with the British Bond’s SPECTRE organization wearing the white hats and saving the world from the evil Russian SMERSH. Although SMERSH was once an actual Russian amalgam of three counterintelligence groups, in Fleming novels SMERSH was an organization of Russian spies and intelligence officers seeking to undermine global democracy. SPECTRE was analogous to MI-5, the British version of the CIA.

 

If you didn’t think about that kind of stuff as much as I did, it was essentially akin to “Spy vs. Spy” comic strips in Mad Magazine with the commies in black and the bumbling “good(ish)” guys in white. If I’m honest, fantasizing about Bond’s girlfriends had something to do with my love of Ian Fleming books. Oddly, though, I never cared for James Bond movies– beyond looking at the so-called Bond “girls”– as the films were too cheesy for me. When I hit high school, I put all that stuff behind me; the Vietnam War nudged me toward Quakerism and an embrace of pacifism.

 

I don’t talk about it much, but every now and then I’m like the reformed smoker who sneaks a cigarette in that I pick up a spy novel for the frisson of a cheap thrill. Midnight Black is Book # 14 of author Mark Greaney’s “Gray Man” series and the second book of his I’ve read. I despise all military jargon, weapons, and things war-related, but I have to give Greaney credit for being very good at what he does. Put another way, Midnight Black was a novel I hated to like. It’s cliched, a throwback to the hottest days of the Cold War, sexist, and so macho it makes Rambo seem like a sissy.

 

Greaney’s “Gray Man” is Court(land) Gentry, code named “Violator.” (Is there any bloody point to code names when both sides of a conflict know who you mean?) He is a decided Rambo-type, a rogue CIA agent who is in and out of the organization depending on who is responsible for reining in his multiple violations of protocol. His one-time handler Matthew Hanley has been demoted to a posting in Bogota and the new guy in the big leather chair keeps Court a veritable prisoner on a military compound, though Court is a manly man who is hard to contain. He’s impossible to do so once he’s told that “Anthem,” his Russian lover Zoya Zakharova, was executed. He simply refuses to believe it and makes plans to smuggle himself inside of Russia, find her, and bring her back to the United States. He continues in that planning even though he has no idea where to look and is told trying to get into Russia is a suicide mission. WWRD? (What Would Rambo Do?)

 

Midnight Black takes us all over Eastern and Northern Europe (Estonia, Latvia, Poland, Ukraine, Finland…) and places Court and all those he contacts in extreme jeopardy. He connects with “Romantic,” Zack Hightower, a sometime partner, sometime rival, as well as various contacts seeking to undermine the Russian Federation, CIA folks working on the sly without permission, and seafaring folk who might get him into Russia or might sell him out for a song. Just like Rambo, Court decides a small team is all that’s needed to take out huge military units. And, of course, Anthem is not dead; she’s in a Russian gulag in Mordovia, as is a popular dissident, Nadai Yarovaya who the West wants to spring from prison but won’t go unless her husband is also freed from a nearby gulag. I guess if you’re going to take out three separate gulags you want to keep things small.  

 

Court is resourceful and exploits splits within the Russian intelligence community. Frankly, the plot line is absurd, with one impossible obstacle piled upon another a The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight fashion. I can’t really assess all of the hardware, explosives, tactics, and military alignments mentioned in the book as I know nothing about such matters. Again, though, the novel is akin to Fleming’s James Bond in that it’s all about the kill, the thrill, and the kiss, not plausibility. Keep a towel handy to wipe up the testosterone.

 

Rob Weir

(Code Name: Shamefaced)

 

 

  

 

Witches and Relics in the Time of Plague

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE STONE WITCH OF FLORENCE (2024)

By Anna Rasche

Park Row, 368 pages

★★★★

 

If you’ve ever studied medieval history, there’s much to like about The Stone Witch of Florence. If you’re a serious scholar of the period, there much that might annoy you. As a recovering medievalist it had elements that made me grab it: witchcraft, the Black Death, church corruption, and just enough accuracy to dissuade me from screaming, “Rubbish!” and hurling it across the room.

 

This is a historical novel written by a gemmologist that flirts with fantasy, folklore, and feminist wish fulfilment in blurring the rare with the customary. As modern Wiccans remind us, the word “witch” is often defined by whatever eyes are looking at it. What word would you attribute to a woman who uses gemstones to heal? Is she a folk physician, a heretic, a rock-wielding mesmerist, a threat to public health?

 

In her debut novel Anna Rache juxtaposes her beleaguered heroine Ginevra de Gasparo with church beliefs in the efficacy of relics. It is 1348, the year the Plague begins to ravage the Italian peninsula. (Think medieval; there’s no such thing as a unified Italian nation-state.) Prior to the outbreak of the Plague, Ginevra’s great ambition was to become a member of the physician’s guild of Florence, which got her banned from the city. Some women were allowed to join guilds, but not many. But let’s not romanticize a medieval physician whose practices of using leeches, bleedings, blistering, and unguents in ways that often differed from the “cures” of witches only in the gender of the applicant. 

 

The terms Plague and Black Death are often used interchangeably though they were not the same thing. The Beath Death looked scarier, with the patient’s body growing pus-filed buboes. Yet it was the most-survivable form of plague; the highly contagious airborne pneumonic plague had a death rate of close to 100 percent. Patients went from health to death in less than a day. (Shades of the early days of Covid, anyone?) Depending on where you were, the Plague carried off between 30-60 percent of the entire population between 1348-51. So were “stone witches” such as Ginevra blamed and burned at the stake? No; witch killings gathered steam between the 15^th-17^th centuries.  In the mid-14^th, it was often the case that only heretics believed in witches at all. Ginevra was allowed back to an increasingly-empty Florence with a vague promise from Inquisitor Michele (male) that he might support her application to the guild.

 

There is a catch, of course. Ginevra is also drawn into what is more of a crisis of public faith than of public health. Michele wants Ginevra’s aid in finding out who is stealing relics from local churches. It is a matter of urgency. After all, if what remains of the populace concludes that faith can’t save them, what need is there for the church, priests, or inquisitors? As Rache writes, “Florentines were not exactly known known as the most pious of peoples.” Pre-Plague Florence was as much a city of bankers, merchants, and luxury, despite its fame for holding numerous important relics. One by one they disappear–the left arm of San Filippo Apostolo, the leg of the martyr Miniato, the skull of San Zenobio, and other items deemed sacred and miraculous? What is to be made of vials of colored water left in their place?

 

All of this builds a strange symbiosis between Michele and Ginevra, though her strongest alliance is with the  wealthy Lucia, who supports her and aids in investigating the mystery of missing relics. As happened so often during the Plague, wealthy men fled the cities for the allegedly miasma-free air of the countryside. In an odd way, the rich were right about that. We now know that fleas hosted by black rats and bred in filthy medieval cities were big culprits in spreading the Plague.

 

The Stone Witch of Florence is an unusual novel. Does Rasche intend us to contrast the official veneration of magical relics with the presumed superstition of Ginerva’s Plague immunity with her pure crystal quartz, her energy with garnet, and her ability to drink men under the table with a piece of amethyst under her tongue? Probably. Are we to draw conclusions about power versus the poor? However you read this novel, rest assured it passes the Bechdel Test with flying colors.

 

Rob Weir