American Saint : The Life of Elizabeth Seton

In this riveting biography of Elizabeth Seton critically acclaimed and bestselling author Joan Barthel tells the mesmerizing story of a woman whose life featured wealth and poverty, passion and sorrow, love and loss. Elizabeth was born into a prominent New York City family in 1774. Her father was the chief health officer for the Port of New York and she lived down the block from Alexander Hamilton. She danced at George Washington's sixty-fifth Birthday Ball wearing cream slippers, monogrammed. Catholicism was illegal in New York when she was born; Catholic priests seen in the city were arrested, sometimes hung. When Elizabeth and her wealthy husband Will sailed to Italy in a doomed attempt to cure his tuberculosis, she and her family were quarantined in a damp dungeon. And when Elizabeth later became a Catholic, she was so scorned that people talked of burning down her house. American Saint is the inspiring story of a brave woman who forged the way for the other women who followed and who made a name for herself in a world entirely ruled by men. Elizabeth resisted male clerical control of her religious order, as nuns are doing today, and the publication of her story could not be more timely. Maya Angelou has contributed the foreword.

“American Saint – The Life of Elizabeth Seton is a map which allows us to follow the journey of this remarkable woman. We are able to examine each stop she made along the way and we are amazed at her courage to get up and start her journey again, against visible and tangible odds.” —Maya Angelou, from her foreword for American Saint

“A significant book, fascinating in its portrayal of a groundbreaking woman, and a great pleasure to read.” —Mary Higgins Clark

“A wonderful, terrifying book . . . Remarkable.” —Nick Clooney

“Barthel is a fine and insightful observer of this larger-than-life woman who was so far ahead two hundred years ago that we're still catching up with her.” —Gloria Steinem

“A rich and moving chronicle of faith.” —Tilar J. Mazzeo, New York Times bestselling author of The Widow Clicquot

“Thoughtful, sensitive, inspiring, provocative, and reliable.” —James Martin, SJ, author of My Life with the Saints