In the 17th century, the deeply religious German astronomer Johannes Kepler explained planetary motion. In the 21rst century, Cathy Ford-Devereaux wanders the streets of St. John's, nursing her own inexplicable pain.

Her uncle, Marty, the solitary, cynical co-founder of a snotty private school, is just as lost. Perpetually detached, Marty sleeps with one of his teachers and begins a hopeless affair with a clinging woman who comes into his orbit through his loose attachment to his brother, Rex, her neighbour. Marty is making face with the big boys in town, trying to expand his "brand". Oil-soaked, post-moratorium St. John's takes centre stage, a truly personified character.

Riche knows St. John's—its moods, its vibe—as if he were a fly on every wall. His literary smacks at developers, city hall, actors, film-makers, writers, and the left-wing activist crowd are entertaining as well as insightful. He understands the human heart just as well; his work says much about how we strive to protect ourselves in the only futile inadequate ways we can think of.

The writing is accessible; the plot development, well-paced; and the characterizations real and generally full. You would think that people as disdainful as Marty and as off-putting as Cathy wouldn't hold you to the page. That was my fear initially but there are just enough hints of their troubled humanness to make it difficult to put the book down. There are loose ends in Nine Planets but the last scene with Marty and Cathy strips these characters bare, completely humanizes them, and leaves the reader moved and satisfied.

This is an important book. It tells the rather amazing story of the Sisters of Mercy since they came to Newfoundland in 1842. In so doing, it teaches us much about Newfoundland history and the history of women here.

Moreover, Bellamy writes with élan, humour, and compassion. She is honest as she attempts to grapple with "the darker threads of human weakness, bewildering pain and failure" that mark the Sisters' history.

The book begins with the fascinating story of the Congregation's founder, Dubliner Catherine McAuley, who lived with a Quaker couple for 20 years before establishing the order. Catherine was "no plaster saint", Bellamy writes, but "wonderfully, beautifully human".

The Sisters came to Newfoundland at the invitation of the unforgettable Bishop Michael Fleming, an Irishman. He had noted with some distress the ecumenical tendencies of Newfoundland Catholics, especially the middle classes, who casually attended Protestant services. He needed the Sisters of Mercy to come and educate them through a fee-paying school.

The rest is history: the Sisters set up all over the island and in Labrador. In 1863, the steamer Ariel took the Sisters to prosperous Burin; they were welcomed by bonfires and salvos of gunfire. Their accomplishments inspire awe. The Glee Club of their flagship school won the prestigious Matheson Trophy in 1964 and performed at Montreal's 1967 Expo. They established St. Clare's Hospital, which opened one of Canada's first palliative care units and had the first computerized laboratory east of Quebec. It goes on and on and is told well.

Consistently responding to the signs of the times, the Sisters produced a self-help book for people living with HIV and AIDS; they opened an alcohol treatment centre and a retreat house for women. When the 1929 tsunami hit Burin, they made cups of tea for the survivors. They witnessed the 'great fire' of 1892 in St. John's, the turmoil that led to Confederation with Canada in 1949, the government resettlement programs of the 1950s and >60s, and the 1992 groundfish moratoria. Bellamy's accounts of some of these events are quite moving.

Some of us have bad memories of the nuns. The convention was that if you got a smack from a nun (or a brother), you'd never tell your parents because then you'd get another smack. This was largely true—that was the cruel way children were raised back then (and through much of western history). But I have seen the Sisters acknowledge and then learn and grow from their mistakes. Is this true of others who practised such child-rearing methods? I think, too, the Sisters have been wrongly tarnished by the terrible crimes of some priests and brothers.

Reading this, I could not help but wonder what will happen to the most vulnerable among us in a world without the Sisters—a scenario that seems inevitable, given their falling numbers.

Deserving of accolades, Weavers contains over 70 pages of photographs and an extensive bibliography. The only thing I would add is a subtitle so readers can more easily identify the book's subject. And I'd probably reduce the use of passive voice.

Alas, I sometimes felt like a voyeur. This wasn't because there's an abundance of detail about the deterioration of his relationship (there isn't) but because I know some of the people who appear here. It's not that they're doing anything particularly shocking or noteworthy (they're not); it's just my style preference—I'd disguise them so readers wouldn't be distracted by the appearance of familiar people.

Lengthy quotes—from Ciaran Carson, Arthur Conan Doyle, etc.—also prove distracting. I wanted to read Dragland, not other writers so, for me, this practice got in the way.

Some of the writing is obscure and you may not always understand what the writer is trying to say. But then you come across p. 37's post-snowstorm commentary which ends with "Because I am a sweet drunk"—and that has to make you smile.