The Testament of Mary - Colm Tóibín

Although this book is slim, it deserves to be taken seriously. It's a beautifully written account of a mother's grief as she gradually loses her son, culminating in her watching his torment as he is crucified, and goes on to show her struggle to preserve her memories of him as they are appropriated and rewritten by those who seek to proclaim their own interpretation of his life. The passages that stay with me most are those about the zombie-like risen Lazarus, and Mary's endless feelings of guilt at her choice to save her own life by running away rather than staying to the end to bathe and bury her son's body.