Mykonos: A Memoir

Raeburn blends her talents as a poet and painter to create delicately drawn views of Mykonos, the Greek island on which she lived for 10 years. She vividly describes the play of colors over the whitewashed walls of her farmhouse home and offers portraits of the island's spirited inhabitants. Sister Kyriaki found a way to serve God and enjoy her own talent by painting small icons of the saints. Iraklis arrived on the island when his sailboat foundered during a solitary pilgrimage to a shrine on Tinos and a boy discovered him on the beach. The author attends a ``pork-eating party,'' a daylong combination of work and celebration beginning with the slaughter of a pig, continuing with butchering and sausage making and ending with feasting and dancing in the evening. Unfortunately, these delightful outward views are often interrupted by trivial inwardly focused observations. Raeburn notes ``my own self-enhancement and ego-preservation,'' and these traits intrude on this memoir. Her relationship with an abusive man, her identity issues and her tears upon drowning a litter of kittens are ultimately less compelling than the world of Mykonos around her. (Feb.)