The first time I saw the monastery, I was thirteen years old, that limbo of an age between childhood and adolescence when you already know who you are but don't yet know whether it is what you will become. A 15th-century portrait artist, grieving the untimely death of his lover, takes refuge at the monastery at Mont Saint-Michel. Though he is illiterate, he is assigned the task of copying manuscripts, helping to produce a vast library that brings the monastery great acclaim. His story is revealed by a young Montreal novelist researching Mont Saint-Michel's history five hundred years later. "Throughout these emotional rescues in the high seas, Dominique Fortier's writing is carried on a rich, beautiful and evocative language. The recurrent use of words from old French adds a patina that is appropriate for this journey filled with touching, illuminating moments ... Dominique Fortier plunges into the depths of human paradox and emerges with a love of books that she shares with grace and generosity." - La Presse (translated from the French) "Dominique Fortier's writing is at once sensitive and interesting, moving and spare. It reveals a man blinded by pain who tells us his story of love, his distress and the light of the smile of a young woman. A book written in quiet emotion that makes for good reading as the wind makes the autumn leaves rustle." - Au fil des pages (translated from the French)