Convent Wisdom

How Sixteenth-Century Nuns Could Save Your Twenty-First-Century Life

De: Ana Garriga, Carmen Urbita

Narrado por: Aida Reluzco

Bloomsbury presents Convent Wisdom by Ana Garriga & Carmen Urbita, read by Aida Reluzco

'Brimming with fascinating historical details' MELISSA FEBOS, MARIE CLAIRE

'Profoundly useful and pleasure seeking' EILEEN MYLES

'A fizzy joy to read' BETSY CORNWELL

An infectiously edifying manual that mines the lives of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century nuns, offering advice for our modern age and proving one thing: no matter the century, nuns know best.

When most of us think of nuns, we picture solemn shuffles down cloistered halls and hands clasped in prayer. But what about the nuns who erupted into jealous fights over makeup or crushed on their girlfriends? In reality, these women were no one-dimensional martyrs. Sixteenth- and seventeenth-century nuns were resourceful, rebellious and refreshingly relatable – and their lives hold surprising lessons for us today.

Convent Wisdom is your guide to navigating the chaos of the modern world with help from history's most fascinating nuns. Struggling with money? Saint Teresa and her fellow Carmelites have some divine budgeting hacks. Drowning in FOMO while scrolling through social media? Mary of Jesus of Ágreda's miraculous ability to be in two places at once might teach you how to finally keep up. Lost in the digital dating pool? Benedetta Carlini's treatise on the seven ways to spot a lesbian nun may offer unexpected insights.

Blending rigorous research with pop culture and personal anecdotes throughout, best friends Ana Garriga and Carmen Urbita lift the veil on monastic life so you can better conquer today's anxiety-ridden, hyper-connected world. From procrastination to imposter syndrome, friendship drama to creativity slumps, the nuns of Convent Wisdom are here to guide you – with a wink and a prayer.

©2025 Ana Garriga, Carmen Urbita (P)2025 Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

Reseñas de la Crítica

This self-help book by two scholarly BFFs is full of wisdom gleaned from the lives of 16th and 17th-century nuns like Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz and Saint Teresa that is applicable to your most modern quandries. The cheeky and insightful volume is also brimming with fascinating historical details, like the penchants of some nuns for side hustles and eating spiders (Melissa Febos)

Nuns have long peppered my own writing because that's exactly what they are. Incendiary stuff. I tout this book madly because this is the back story that explains the inquisition we are now living through as well as revealing the fact that sixteenth-century nuns had the internet. I am panting with joy. And it's a wormhole into the elaborate, interior museum, sex club, library, bakery, community space and in diaspora the convent always was. Carmen and Ana, I thank you mightily for this profoundly useful and pleasure-seeking book (Eileen Myles)

When it comes to advice on life and love, where else would you turn besides sixteenth century nuns? Convent Wisdom is here to help us get in the habit of learning from the past (Nicole Tersigni, bestsellng author of MEN TO AVOID IN ART AND LIFE)

Playful and inventive, Convent Wisdom is a delight for the intellectually curious reader. A pair of witty scholar-storytellers, Ana Garriga and Carmen Urbita, share stories of their devotion to each other and of the 16th-century nuns whose lives parallel ours in surprising ways. Through some alchemy they've transformed what could have been a survey course in historical religious figures into a treasure chest of revelations and nuggets of self-help (Duchess Goldblatt)

An invitation to sit at the cool nuns’ table, Convent Wisdom is for anyone who longs for more sisterhood, solitude, or sapphic drama (who doesn’t?). It’s at once juicy and funny and meticulously researched, an educational deep dive that’s also a fizzy joy to read. I’m already planning to gift it to several of my honourary sisters this year. I loved it! (Betsy Cornwell, author of RING OF SALT)

A wonderfully entertaining book. . . Convent Wisdom shows us that monasticism is not an anachronism, but rather a deep well from which we can draw guidance and comfort. The lives of the sisters and saints in Convent Wisdom are as relevant today as they were in their own time (Sister Monica Clare, author of A CHANGE OF HABIT)