THE BURNING ROAD

A Novel of Junípero Serra

A dying man. Ten thousand miles of road. One question that will not let him rest.

In August 1784, Father Junípero Serra lies dying in a small adobe cell at the edge of the world. He has walked farther than any missionary in history. He has founded nine missions along the California coast. He has baptized thousands of souls and buried hundreds of children who died from diseases he carried in his breath.

Now, with his final hours approaching, he looks back on a life consumed by holy fire—and asks the question he has avoided for fifty years:

Did the good outweigh the harm?

The Burning Road is the intimate confession of a man the Catholic Church made a saint and protesters tore from his pedestal. Told in Serra's own voice, this sweeping literary novel follows him from a stone village in Mallorca to the mountains of Mexico to the uncharted wilderness of California, where his dreams of saving souls collided with the brutal realities of empire.

Here is the young friar who wept through his first Mass. The professor who abandoned his students to chase a calling he could not refuse. The missionary who pleaded for mercy for the men who murdered his closest friend—and who offered to send shackles for the converts who tried to flee his love.

This is not hagiography. This is not condemnation. This is something harder: a man seen whole.

Balanced Account Of Serra’s Life

This novel made me feel like I was traveling alongside Serra. They were incredible details that I never knew about, despite visiting several missions. The thing that stood out to me the most about this novel, was that the author did not shy away from the negative impact to the indigenous people of California.