Anita Odessa

Babble From The Church House Anita Odessa

When corporate lawyer Anita Odessa leaves Toronto to live in a spellbinding church in the Village of Millbrook, there's something she isn't telling anyone - not her husband, her kids or readers of the popular humour column that she goes on to write about the experience. The truth is, she already knows the building intimately. She's been exploring it in a recurring dream ever since she was a girl. From mysterious house guests to a spirited playlist, unseen help in the kitchen and a flood of epic proportions, living at the church, the extraordinary quickly becomes Odessa's ordinary. When she is asked by the Village paper, THE MILLBROOK TIMES, for an interview about church life, she already has enough stories to captivate readers for years. And that is what she does. In this collection of columns by turns hilariously and lusciously told - beginning with her family's move to The Church House, as it is affectionately called by her children, and culminating many years later, in lockdown for COVID-19 - Odessa shares her effervescent reflections not just on living in the church, but on motherhood, community, transformation and ultimately, having the faith to dive heartfirst into your dream without knowing where the current will take you.