Recommended Reading: Bonus Online Review

Theologically inclined readers who appreciate unusual stories of crime and detective work may find themselves unable to put down British author Phil Rickman’s series of novels featuring the Rev. Merrily Watkins, a thirty-something single mother raising a smart-aleck teenage daughter, ministering in a rural parish on the border of England and Wales, and serving as the Minister of Deliverance for her diocese. In The Wine of Angels (London: Pan Macmillan, 1999) Merrily learns early in her work as a parish priest that not all spirit is good, and is dismayed to discover that the Church is largely reluctant to help her deal with the negative spiritual manifestations she encounters in the village of Ledwardine. Receiving training in deliverance ministry (exorcism and related healing practices) in the second book of the series, Midwinter of the Spirit (London: Pan Macmillan, 2000), Merrily is appointed to help others in the diocese who experience such problems. Not for the faint of heart, this series includes some rather violent and wrenching scenes of evil (both human and supernatural), and implicitly warns readers about naïveté and lack of discernment in dealing with matters of the spirit.

—Stephanie Crumley-Effinger, Director of Field Studies