Motherhouse

First novelist Hathaway exhibits delicate control over powerful material-- the travails of a young woman whose deep religious faith is fulfilled and then tested. In 1963, at age 18, Jeanine Buchwald enters a convent, and then must navigate the turbulent years of change that rapidly follow. Told in passionate, unsentimental prose, her story becomes a metaphor for the struggles of many during that decade, as commonly accepted rules of order--in convents and in the world--fell before the challenge of individuality. Raised in Chicago, the eldest of nine children, Jeanine becomes Sister Kristin after two years of study and begins teaching in elementary schools in the Midwest. As the changes wrought by the Second Vatican Council shake the structure of her chosen life and her convictions about her calling (``I entered the religious life with a whole heart and ever since have been taking it back . . .''), a brother dies in a car accident and her parents separate. Like her namesake St. Joan, Jeanine--she has discarded her nun's name along with her habit--must learn to hear and heed her own voice. Grounded firmly in concrete details but unequivocally spiritual, this is a lyrical, inspiring chronicle. (Feb.)