The Staircase

by Ann Rinaldi

First published 2000

Amazon

4.2(82)

Lizzy Enders is sent to the Sisters of Loretto’s academy in Santa Fe after her mother’s death, although her Methodist upbringing has taught her to distrust Catholic ritual. Lonely and defensive, she forms an uneasy friendship with José, a carpenter whose skill and guarded history draw him into the problem of reaching the chapel’s choir loft.

The legend of the miraculous staircase becomes a test of Lizzy’s willingness to see faith outside the boundaries she inherited. Prayer, vocation, prejudice and forgiveness shape both the mystery and her moral growth, making the novel specifically Christian fiction as well as a historical coming-of-age story set in the multicultural American Southwest.