Sin is behovely (inevitable in context, perhaps beneficial to someone) and carries no fault (it is simply bad, like a trip or a fall). Written with profound insight, spiritual and psychological, and a rare sensitivity to the everyday world of the fourteenth century, I, Julian is a brilliantly illuminating companion to one of the greatest works of spiritual writing in English. It is as if we have finally found the lost autobiography of one of the medieval world's most important women.

Hold on tight: the intense first-person narrative is quite hard to read, with many strange formulations of language, but… it is worth it to persevere. To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average.It is as if we have finally found the lost autobiography of one of the medieval world's most important women .

Julian's life is touched by loss, through pestilence, death and her own decision to live as an anchorite, locked into a cell attached to a church for decades. This rather wonderful fictional autobiography was published to coincide with the 650th anniversary of Julian first experiencing, in May 1373, the series of 16 visions she wrote about in Revelations of Divine Love.And the person speaking would after a time fall into silence, and she would hold their gaze with her loving look, and the love would reflect in their faces as sweet lightness. Everything has dissolved, even the little word, and there is only God beholding in me and I am no one and no where. using no words save perhaps one word, and with that little word gently repeating my soul quietens and softens and the little word enters me and brings me to deep, deep rest in my soul, which becomes no place. What seems indisputable is that Julian was the author of the first work written in English by a woman.

I can’t enumerate all 16 here, but Revelation 14, on the subject of sin and prayer, is of particular importance. Slightly Foxed introduces its readers to books that are no longer new and fashionable but have lasting appeal. There are also vivid descriptions of the multiple miscarriages – ‘13 graves in my heart’ – suffered by Julian’s friend, Isabel. Battling grief, plague, the church and societal expectations, and compelled by her powerful visions, Julian finds a way to live a life of freedom - as an anchoress, bricked up in a small room on the side of a church.As time passes, she must overcome the departure and passing of her ‘minders’: those who love her, including her maid Alice, her confessor Thomas, and her benefactor the Countess of Sussex. Claire Foster-Gilbert inhabits Julian of Norwich in the way that Hilary Mantel immersed herself in Cromwell. The Timeline at the end is a fascinating and bittersweet summary of the life and times of Dame Julian of Norwich. All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well', but knew very little about. This book is going to introduce many new readers to Julian and inspire others who know her slightly to go back with fresh eyes and a reinvigorated sense of how her writing developed and in what sort of historical setting.

From the author of Miles to Go before I Sleep comes I, Julian, the account of a medieval woman who dares to tell her own story, battling grief, plague, the church and societal expectations to do so. Julian's manuscripts are protected by trusted sisters and are passed from hand to hand, become the first book to be written by a woman in English.

The sharp green new leaves of the birches shimmering in the light, the intoxicating smell of the may, its frothy blossom bud-bursting on the blackthorn, the new ferns unfolding, the springy grass under the horses’ hoofs, this twisted tree trunk and the ivy that clings to it, the rich fresh green that is emerging everywhere. Julian's meditative and other spiritual practices give her insights that almost match those of Buddhism. I, Julian is beautifully written, capturing the voice of a woman we can only really know through very brief historical records and her own centuries old words with a clarity that is compelling. Julian joins a lay company of devout women, happy, frankly, no longer to have to bear the burden of a “household”.