Long before the majestic cathedral of Chartres stood on top of the granite promontory overlooking the forests of the Carnutes, the site was a sanctuary where druids congregated from all over Gaul to worship the virgin about to give birth. To this day Chartres is home to one of the most revered Black Madonnas in the world, but its foundations reach far back into ancient Celtic culture. In The Black Madonna and the Young Sculptor, Celtic traditions, which the conquering Romans tried to suppress, merge with nascent Christianity, still swaddled in its receptive innocence.  

     It is 99 A.D., many centuries before the town of Carnotum became Chartres, Bryok, the druid, asks a young sculptor to carve the new Black Virgin, after the old one was viciously destroyed. Caradoc accepts, not realizing what perils await him. Questions arise: who is the veiled woman who leads him to the secret grotto where he is called upon to carve the new virgin? Who is trying to prevent him from completing his task, and why? And, most importantly, who is the Black Virgin and how should she be depicted? These and other questions precipitate a quest to the coastal Mount Tombe to find answers from the seven hermits, and to Lutetia in search of an abducted woman whose face he’s never seen, but who has found a place in his heart. 

      The Black Madonna and the Young Sculptor is a riveting tale bordering on the mythic, while delving into arcane realms of Celtic, Roman, and Christian traditions. It enchants and guides the reader along an array of rich imaginations, stimulating the mind to traverse through the earth’s fertile darkness toward the light filled heights of the spirit.