The Sin Eater by Megan Campisi

The Sin Eater by Megan Campisi

"The Sin Eater walks among us, unseen, unheard

Sins of our flesh become sins of Hers

Following Her to the grave, unseen, unheard

The Sin Eater Walks Among Us."

Dried raisins for adultery, orange marmalade for bigamy, porridge for bearing a grudge, eel pie for fault finding, pomegranate for witchcraft and a deer heart for killing! The list goes on.

The Sin Eater is a wonderfully written story of power, unjust, treason and finding freedom in one of the most unexpected of places; by being an outcast. Set in a slightly disguised sixteenth century England, this historical fantasy is woven around a young Sin Eater named May Owens. Fourteen years of age and recently orphaned, May was sent to jail for stealing a loaf of bread. Her fate was sealed when a judge sentenced her to become a Sin Eater; a rejected woman brutally marked and forced to take an oath not to speak with the outside world except at funeral recitations.

Thrown into uncharted waters of being a Sin Eater, May watches her old life diminish in front of her eyes while hearing final confessions of the dying, eating food for their sins as a funeral rite, guaranteeing access to heaven. Apprenticed to an old Sin Eater, Ruth, May lives in exile, friendless and lonely. Ironically though, finding food to survive becomes the least of her problems.

Megan Campisi’s “The Sin Eater” caught my eye due to its rather unusual title. Do you know that actual Sin Eaters lived in the fifteenth to seventeenth century England, and the last known Sin Eater, Richard Munslow died in 1906?

The author has incorporated fantastic elements such as different food for different sins instead of bread and salt to make the story more interesting. May’s unwavering courage in adversity and intelligence, seeps through the pages and enchants the reader. You can laugh out loud hearing May’s mind chatter; people she met at her recitations - Pig man, Black fingers, Cut-throat, Willow Tree and the rest of them. Though I found these names were confusing at times, the story kept me spellbound until the end.

May’s new life takes a darker turn when a deer heart appears on the coffin of a royal governess who did not confess to the sin it represents. The older Sin Eater who refuses to eat it, was taken to prison, tortured and killed. A series of questionable deaths rattles the royals afterwards. While an unknown murderer roams freely in the castle corridors, devastated with guilt and feeling responsible for Ruth’s death, will May ever be able to find the ugly truth behind the deer heart and avenge the unnecessary death of her friend?

The Sin Eater, is the winner of the Historical Writers' Association (HWA) Crown Award 2021 for a first historical fiction novel. This beautiful yet heart wrenching historical fantasy with a trickle of romance, is available for borrowing at Greater Dandenong Libraries.

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