Year of Wonders

Content Warning: This section of the guide describes and discusses the source text’s treatment of child death, extreme violence towards women, detailed descriptions of traumatic births, and painful death.

Although some are already rotten, Anna collects the last apples from the fall harvest. She cuts an apple for the rector Michael Mompellion, her employer, and offers to read to him from the Bible, but he says she is illiterate. Anna reminds him that Mrs. Mompellion taught her to read. He doesn’t want to hear the scriptures today, so Anna takes a few apples to the stables for his horse, Anteros. Anna notices the deplorable state of the stables and the stable boy sleeping in the corner. She feeds the agitated stallion the apple, but he prefers his master, who hasn’t ridden him. When she returns to the house, the rector is pacing and hasn’t touched his apple. Anna resolves to make cider from the remaining apples.

Anna walks home through the orchard, bringing back happy memories of when her husband, Sam Frith, proposed to her when she was only 15. Though strict Puritans ruled the town, Anna was content with her life.