Member Reviews
Carolyn P, Media/Journalist
Patya, the fifteen-year-old daughter and granddaughter of healers, is devastated when Kuyllay, her beloved grandmother, dies unexpectedly. She leaves Patya a special robe of white feathers, a silver mask with the face of an owl, and a heritage of sacred dance passed down through the women of her family. Patya’s mother, Keyka, hands her the gift but also tells her to set it aside until the time is right for the Owl Woman to return.
Patya’s grief escalates when the local religious leader Achiq insists on taking Kuyllay’s head as a sacred umanqa, intended to channel power to himself, rather than leaving the body with her family. But life is difficult on the western coast of sixth-century Peru. The water channels that have sustained the Nasca community to which Patya belongs are drying up, and Achiq has a certain level of support among desperate farmers watching their livelihoods disappear. One of his supporters is Patya’s uncle. The community also faces attacks and incursions by neighboring groups who also suffer from the drought perceived as evidence of divine displeasure.
Amid this social and familial conflict, Patya undertakes a solitary pilgrimage to the sacred mountain Yuraq Orqo, the White Mountain, the Giver of Waters—a coming-of-age ritual delayed by her grandmother’s death. The vision she experiences there sends her off on a far more dangerous mission, one that will test both her strengths and her loyalties.
Patya is an appealing heroine—an artist and a dancer as well as a healer—but what really sets this novel apart is the rich imagining of a long-ago society, its worldview and mythology, which draws the reader into a little-known past.
I plan to interview this author on my blog (link below) in May 2025.
Graisi O, Media/Journalist
Thank you K. M. Huber, SparkPress and Netgalley for this free ARC in exchange for a review.
This was a fairly good spiritual novel, but it moved along too slowly.
