One of the best novels I have read. Base on a true story and should have been compulsory reading at school!

Catholic or not, you may be amazed at this story of the eccentric teenage girl who unwittingly initiates a spiritual movement. She's only doing what her vision of "the Lady" tells her to do, from eating dirt to putting her face into thorns.
It is a difficult but well-crafted novel. I read the Ludwig Lewisohn translation from the original (there may be others).

While Bernadette and her family suffer harrassment from the authorities, they are supported by the people of the community, who wish so badly to believe in a miracle. I enjoyed the scene where, secretly and after dark, the workmen construct a basin to contain the trickle of water discovered by Bernadette. It miraculously is a flowing spring!

I also like the image of the crowds mimicking Bernadette's every movement as she follows "the Lady's" sometimes irrational instructions each morning. The people so desire to believe that Bernadette's actions have meaning, when the reader suspects that it is all just product of mental illness. Good historical reading.

The Jewish author Franz Werfel wrote this novel after stopping at Lourdes on his way out of Nazi-occupied Europe. Impressed by what he observed at the famous shrine, he vowed that if he ever reached "the saving shores of America", he would do his best to "sing the song of Bernadette". As his wish was granted, his vow was honored. Interestingly, during the course of the novel, published at a time of extreme religious intolerance in Europe, we learn that Protestants as well as Jews also make pilgrimages to Lourdes.
The story is about the life of Bernadette Soubirous, an asthmatic fourteen-year-old peasant girl whose family have fallen on hard times. Noteworthy is the fact that Bernadette's mother, Louise, had a gift for healing the sick as other women of the Saint's matrilineal line.
The first apparition takes place on February 11, 1858 after her father has a lamentable day doing menial labor, and she, her sister, Marie, and friend, Jeanne Abadie are sent to collect firewood for their home. The ailing Bernadette stays on one side of the freezing pond water to prevent her asthma from becoming worse while the other go ahead, and in a frightening, tense moment, she is greeted by a pixie-like lady with a white veil,a white gown, dark hair, blue eyes, and a blue sash with a gold rose on each foot who smiles consistently.
In the days and weeks that follow, Bernadette's friends and foes align themselves either in her favor or against her. But miracles in the grotto take place when a blinded stonecutter and an ailing infant are among the first to be healed by water from the spring that the Lady told Bernadette to dig. However, moments of vindication for Bernadette come slowly. Eventually, she even wins the approval of the Empress Eugenie, who dispatches her son's governess to get some of the water to help heal him.
With the words "I am the Immaculate Conception", the Apparition of 1858 also answered the issue about how the Mother of Christ had to be conceived without sin at a time when the Catholic Church had begun to discuss that topic at length.
The Lady promises Bernadette that she will not be granted happiness in this life, but only in the next. Indeed, the story follows Bernadette through the 13 years she spent in the Convent of Nevers (where her incorrupt remains are on display to this day), being tormented by a jealous nun, and helping to nurse soldiers during the Franco-Prussian War. The ailing soldiers called for her more than any other nurse.
After dealing with many ailments and tragedies(her mother died shortly after she entered the convent in 1866), Bernadette, who never loses her sense of humour through it all, dies of tuberculosis at the age of 35 in 1879. She was canonized in 1933 and is one of the favorite modern Saints of the Catholic Church.
When Franz Werfel's own story becomes intertwined with Bernadette's, we realize that we are presented with two stories about moments of grace; that of a humble peasant girl's priviledge of seeing the Mother of God face to face, and of a non-Christian's finding solace in the Visionary's native village, and ultimately escaping his persecutors.
Werfel, in fulfillment of his vow to write about the young Seeress if his own mortal life was saved from the Nazis, has done Bernadette great justice, exposing more people to her life story in an entertaining and engaging way.

I am almost finished listening to the Audible format of this book, and am transported by its graceful and profound simplicity. The narrator is excellent, skillfully taking on the roles of her narrated characters. Her characterization of Bernadette is one of innocence and wide-eyed truthfulness, but she is just as equal to giving hard crustiness and slimy hypocrisy to Bernadettes detractors. To Catholics, this book will be an inspiration. And to those who have been or are planning to visit Lourdes, it will explain the very un-subtle commercial atmosphere of the town, so unlike Bernadette would have wished.