Before She was St. Bridget (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798197218735)

Before She Was St. Bridget tells the untold story of Ireland's beloved saint before the miracles, monasteries, and legends.

Raised in isolation on the edge of the forests of Ireland by her quiet mother and the druid Maithghean, Bridget is a strange child-blunt, endlessly curious, deeply compassionate, and far more comfortable among ravens, beggars, and wandering priests than among other people. When an act of charity angers Maithghean, Bridget is suddenly taken from her mother and delivered to the powerful chieftain who is her true father.

Inside the crowded ring fort, Bridget occupies a place that is neither servant nor family. While struggling to understand the household's confusing rules, she quietly begins healing the sick, feeding the hungry, studying Brehon law, and following the teachings of Patricius, the Christian missionary spreading a new faith across Ireland.

As storms, famine, births, deaths, and whispers of miracles sweep through the land, Bridget's kindness and stubborn sense of justice begin changing the people around her-even as her father repeatedly tries to rid himself of the inconvenient daughter who refuses to behave as society expects.

Told through the eyes of a deeply observant young girl who sees the world differently, Before She Was St. Bridget is a richly imagined historical coming-of-age story about faith, loss, freedom, and the making of one of Ireland's most enduring saints.