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When the words of the Lord’s Prayer abandon Patrick one ordinary Sunday morning, everything he believes about himself unravels. For decades he has faithfully served the small community of St Swithin’s. Has he given his life to a lost cause?
Anne never expected her world to shrink to the four walls of her mother’s house. Years spent caring have quietly replaced the adventures she once loved, until her sister bundles her out for a single evening off.
The only two customers in their sleepy village pub, Anne and Patrick strike up a conversation, until they’re interrupted by an unlikely arrival: Phoenix, a pink-haired animal activist with a heavy past, a dead phone, and nowhere else to be.
Then a power cut draws Geoffrey through the door. Grieving and angry, he hasn’t spoken to a soul in months, and he’d rather not start now.
When the unlikely trio see Geoffrey slip back into his isolated life, compassion and curiosity spark an idea: Could a book club entice the professor back out?
What begins as a kindness to a stranger becomes something no one saw coming. As the pages turn and the seasons change, these four strangers discover that the things they thought they’d lost – faith, freedom, connection and hope – might not be gone after all. And that the family we stumble into by accident can be exactly the one we needed all along.
Cozy Christian Fiction Set in an English Village
What happens when four people – who’ve quietly given up on anything good ever reaching them – end up forming a book club?
The Doubting Vicar’s Book Club is a warm, gentle novel about loss, belonging, and the hope that finds us when we’ve stopped looking for it. It carries its faith lightly — there’s nothing preachy here, just real people, real questions, and the quiet sense that Someone might be at work behind the scenes of even the most ordinary life.
It’s the kind of story you can sink into by the fire on a winter evening — and exactly the kind you’ll want to press into a friend’s hands the moment you’ve finished.
Who is The Doubting Vicar’s Book Club for?
Have you ever felt too lost, too far gone, or too ordinary for anything good to reach you? Then this book was written for you.
It’s also for the people in your life who might not yet pick up a memoir or a book about faith, but who would happily lose themselves in a gentle, uplifting story. Wherever you are on your journey — exploring faith for the first time, walking closely with God, or not sure you believe any of it — you are welcome here.
Why This Book Matters
The Doubting Vicar’s Book Club stands out in three lovely ways:
- It shows that even when we’re not looking for Him, God is quietly at work behind the scenes — often through the unexpected people around us.
- It presents the Gospel clearly, but never in a cheesy or pushy way, revealing that we don’t have to “buy into religion” in order to have a real relationship with God.
- It meets you exactly where you are: if you’re ready, you’ll find hope and encouragement to begin or deepen a journey of faith; and if you’re not, you’ll simply be uplifted — never judged — by a beautiful story of hope and community.
It’s a gentle, hopeful novel about being found, even when you’d stopped expecting it.
How can I order The Doubting Vicar’s Book Club?
The Doubting Vicar’s Book Club is being published by Broad Place Publishing in November 2026. You can support this book by pre-ordering it now. Pre-ordering helps us determine the size of the print run and pay for it.
You can also sponsor this project to help us bring Rachel’s novel to print. Your support will help cover publication costs and get this gentle, faith-filled story into the hands of the readers who need it most — even if they can’t afford it. You can donate below:
The Doubting Vicar’s Book Club is set in a quiet English village and follows four very ordinary people: a vicar in crisis, a woman quietly disappearing into her caring role, a fierce young animal activist struggling with rejection, and a retired professor stuck in grief. They don’t have much in common — but a small book club in the local pub brings them together. What unfolds is a story about struggling people finding the answers they’d given up on, through the most unlikely of communities.