In 1241 medieval France, the all-powerful Catholic Church doesn’t take kindly to anyone who questions its authority. So when Dolssa de Sigata, an eighteen year old noblewoman begins healing people by channeling the divine energy of Jesus, who she calls her “beloved,” the Church hands down a death sentence: she and her mother are to be burned at the stake as heretics. But just as Dolssa is about to be thrown on the pyre, her ropes are miraculously loosened and she is told to “RUN!” Believing she has just been saved by her beloved, Dolssa flees into the countryside, only to sicken and starve as she has no idea how to live outside the walls of her villa. Enter Bottile, a bawdy barmaid/matchmaker who finds Dolssa on the side of the road and brings her back to her  tiny seaside home of Bajas, where she hides Dolssa in the tavern she runs with her two sisters. As the gentlewoman begins to heal under the peasant’s tender care, the Church dispatches a team of priests and even a knight to find Dolssa and bring her back to be burned. Once Dolssa regains her strength, she wants to help those who have helped her. But when word of her miracles reaches the Church, their retribution is swift and it may be that instead of helping, Dolssa has doomed the entire village of Bajas to suffer her fiery fate. This delicious doorstop of a historical fiction is chock full of mystery, suspense, romance and setting details that will make your mouth water and your nose fill with the smell of roasted fish, sun-ripened grapes and sea salt. Frantic to find out what would happen to sweet Dolssa and saucy Bottile, I raced through the pages but look forward to going back and savoring the fascinating medieval vocab and spot-on historical detail. A thorough author’s note at the back will help you appreciate both, as will a character list, glossary and bibliography. Honestly, I was SHOCKED at how geeked-out I became about female heretics in medieval France! And I think you will be too when The Passion of Dolssa wings its way to your nearest library, bookstore or e-reader April 2016.