Thrust into this sensual environment, she was drawn to Padre Vittorio, a handsome Italian priest, and underwent a belated coming of age. For the next three years, she struggled to reconcile human desire with spiritual longing. In spare but lyric language, Bissell weaves a powerful story of love, death, guilt, and redemption--a pilgrimage that reaches beyond dogma to personal truth and evokes a transformation that changes not only Beryl but the lives of those whom she most loves.