Stone Yard Devotional, authored by Charlotte Wood, was originally published on October 3, 2023, by Allen & Unwin. It is a work of literary fiction that is narrated in the first person by an unnamed protagonist as she abandons her life to move to an abbey in her hometown on the Monaro Plains of Australia. Though not religious, she creates a life amongst the nuns of the abbey. She thinks often of her mother but finds her peace disturbed by the arrival of a plague of mice, the remains of a former nun, and a woman from her past from who she seeks forgiveness. The novel was shortlisted for the 2024 Booker Prize and contains themes such as The Pursuit of Redemption, The Importance of Empathy in Parent-Child Relationships, and Isolation as a Catalyst for Self-Discovery.

This guide references the 2023 paperback edition of the novel.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions of bullying, sexual violence, rape, mental illness, child abuse, child sexual abuse, pregnancy loss, child death, death by suicide, suicidal ideation, animal death, graphic violence, illness or death, physical abuse, emotional abuse, and references to anti-Aboriginal racism.

Plot Summary

The protagonist visits the graves of her parents on her hours-long drive to the abbey. While she stands over their plot, she thinks of how close she is to their remains. The abbey is in Australia’s Monaro Plains, outside the protagonist’s hometown. When she arrives, she observes the desolate landscape and introduces herself to Sister Simone, who runs the abbey. Over the course of five days, the protagonist relishes the peace of life in a religious community.

Outside the abbey, the protagonist works for the Threatened Species Rescue Centre, though she struggles to believe that her work outweighs the environmental harm she does through her modern lifestyle. At the abbey, she can lead a different life. While there, she receives a text from her husband, Alex, who has landed at Heathrow. Both know she will not join him there. After attending many services and recognizing a man she went to high school with, Richard Gittens, the protagonist leaves.

Years later, having visited the abbey many more times, the protagonist moves there permanently, though she does not become a sister. She becomes involved in their daily life, in charge of gardening, tending the chickens, and even cooking meals. She finds that she appreciates the peace this new life brings. One day, as she works in the garden with Sister Bonaventure, Sister Simone finds them and tells Bonaventure, “They’ve found her” (51). The two sisters leave, and the protagonist learns later that they were speaking of Sister Jenny.

Sister Jenny joined the abbey decades ago alongside Sister Bonaventure but left to establish a shelter for battered women in Bangkok. Jenny disappeared after a priest, whose housekeeper had accused him of assault, confronted Jenny and dragged her away. Now, after heavy rainfall, Jenny’s bones washed out from under a tree. Sister Simone announces that the remains of Sister Jenny will come to the abbey and that they will bury her. Everyone wonders how they will get past the COVID-19 travel restrictions.

The protagonist rarely hears from people from her old life, and every time she does, she feels guilty for abandoning them but knows she cannot explain to them why she left. She occasionally has trouble fitting in at the abbey, as some of the sisters chastise her for her lack of belief. The protagonist thinks of her mother often, especially as she works. Her mother loved to garden, always helped people in need, and took measures to care for the environment, like composting, that were seen as odd at the time. After two nights of hearing the piano in the middle of the night, Sister Simone and the protagonist open the piano to find a mouse’s nest. Soon, mice are everywhere.

The mice soon become a plague, and Richard Gittens helps the sisters set traps, but the mice are overwhelming, and the sisters are hesitant to kill them. After much speculation on how Sister Jenny’s remains will return to the abbey, Sister Simone announces that they will be accompanied by Sister Helen Parry.

When the protagonist was in high school, there was a local girl whom everyone hated. She was poor, and her mother, though often absent, abused her. She was antagonistic and refused to try to fit in with the girls, making them despise her. One day, the protagonist and other girls in their class beat the girl, though no one was disciplined, as the headmaster hated the girl too. After this, the girl did not return to the school. That girl was Helen Parry. Helen is now a famous nun and activist. When the protagonist met Helen again as an adult at a protest, she apologized to her for what she had done in high school, but Helen refused to forgive her.

The mice continue to overwhelm the abbey, and the protagonist and sisters throw their corpses over the back fence. The mice haunt every room, except the good room, where Sister Jenny’s bones will sit until a burial is approved by local authorities. When the remains come, the sisters gather around them before Helen Parry arrives. Helen joins them but does not recognize the protagonist, and when the protagonist asks Richard Gittens if he remembers Helen, she is embarrassed that he does not.

The protagonist thinks more and more of her mother, and of how much she did not understand about the woman. She was a mystery for much of her life but now the protagonist wishes she could see her mother again, equipped with more wisdom and maturity to build a relationship. Birds begin dying as they eat the bodies of poisoned mice and the sisters realize they must bury the corpses. Many secretly blame Helen for the plague of mice, seeing her presence as a bad omen. Helen stays away from the sisters, working from the barn on her computer, trapped because of COVID-19 travel restrictions.

As time goes on, the protagonist becomes desensitized to the dead mice, changing traps and burying their corpses without a second thought, though the live ones scare her. Jenny’s remains stay in the abbey while Sister Simone seeks government permission to bury her. Every night, Helen watches the news, and the horrible things happening in the world haunt the protagonist. The protagonist also struggles with the sisters around her. She is horrified to learn that Sister Carmel abandoned her teenage children to join the abbey and feels no remorse.

The protagonist cannot find any religious faith during daily services. The mice continue to plague the abbey, and Richard Gittens digs a pit for their corpses. One morning, after a nightmare, the protagonist goes for a swim to reset herself. As she leaves, Helen arrives and does the same thing. As the days pass, the tension over Helen’s presence rises, though the protagonist sympathizes with her former classmate. The protagonist finds her mind straying to the past, thinking of her mother and her past experiences. She focuses a lot on what it means to achieve forgiveness, reading about saints and those who hurt them.

Helen and the protagonist begin to interact more. One day, the protagonist sits with Sister Jenny’s remains alongside Sister Bonaventure. Sister Bonaventure reveals that she and Jenny fought before Jenny left and that without a resolution, she is still angry with the murdered nun. One night, Helen reveals that she accompanied Jenny’s remains in order to visit her dying mother.

Rain begins to fall persistently, but it does not drive the mice away as expected. Their constant presence reminds the protagonist that she will eventually die, terrifying her. The revelation that Helen is here to see her mother reminds the protagonist of all the abuses her mother committed against her. One day, Helen asks the protagonist if she can join her on a trip into town. When they go, Helen secures a flight out of Australia and asks the protagonist to make a few stops before they return to the abbey. They stop at their high school and at Helen’s run-down childhood home.

When Helen has the protagonist stop at the hospital and sit outside the mental health wing, the protagonist realizes that this is where Helen’s mother was when she so often disappeared. The protagonist begins to understand why Helen, who would fight anyone, accepted her mother’s abuse with patience. The protagonist realizes that the entire town, including her own typically generous mother, abandoned this girl. Their final stop is the aged care center, where Helen visits her mother. As they drive back to the abbey, Helen tells the protagonist that her mother tried to love her.

Sister Simone announces that they will bury Sister Jenny in the Stone Yard paddock, an idea suggested to her by Helen. They will bury the remains without local approval and before Helen leaves. They bring Sister Jenny to the hole Richard Gittens digs, and the protagonist helps lower the remains down to Helen. She then helps Helen climb out of the hole. As they say their prayers, the protagonist silently hopes for Helen’s forgiveness but knows that Helen has bigger matters on her mind. As the protagonist watches Richard fill in the grave, Helen walks away, packing her car. She is gone before the protagonist returns to the abbey.