“Angeline,” by Port Townsend author Anna Quinn, explores life as a nun on an island outpost in the Salish Sea.

In February, Port Townsend author Anna Quinn introduced her second novel, “Angeline.” As with her previous book, “The Night Child,” Quinn probes how family dysfunction, alcoholism and traumatic loss at a young age can have lasting psychological impacts.

But this time around, the title character has decided to cope with the tragic loss of her family by becoming a nun.

Pray, eat, chant, clean, cook, read, pray — for seven years, the predictable rhythm of devotion and silence has kept Angeline steady after being the sole survivor in a car accident that took the lives of her parents and younger brother.

But in “Angeline,” all that is about to change. In the opening chapters of this story, the Sisters of Mercy learn that the Archdiocese of Chicago can no longer afford to keep their cloistered convent operating, so the nuns will be dispersed.

After much prayer, the prioress has decided that Sister Angeline should go to Light of the Sea, located on a remote island in the Northwest. Run by an abbess whom the prioress describes as “the Gloria Steinem of nuns,” the tiny convent consists of five activist Sisters who have been excommunicated, but who persist in maintaining their spiritual community and making it open to all.

This is not the life of atonement and quiet prayer that Sister Angeline had envisioned for herself.

She abides by the prioress’ instructions nonetheless and before long finds herself disembarking from a ferry onto a picturesque island in the Salish Sea.

At first, the place seems idyllic — and the author invites her readers to imagine the setting by supplying an abundance of sensory details. There are beautiful forests, pastures and beaches, abundant wildlife and freshly harvested fruits and veggies on the dinner table every night. Sister Angeline even has her colorful yurt to live in instead of the stark cell she inhabited in Chicago.

This week’s book

“Angeline” by Anna Quinn

Blackstone Publishing — 292 pp — $25.99

But she soon realizes that there are problems, too. Each of the nuns has issues to grapple with — beyond their cozy cluster of yurts, the island medic is suffering from survivor’s guilt, the children on the island are coping with various stressors and a new parish priest who has been sent to the island to rebuild the Catholic Church’s orthodox presence there engages in strident opposition to the nuns and their open-door policy.

Quinn seems to be illustrating the idea that no man (or woman, or child) is an island, but she introduces an ambitious slate of issues into this story — LGBTQ+ rights, women’s rights, spiritual searching and religious freedom, gun violence, terrorism, sexual harassment, substance abuse, animal abuse and more. While certainly true-to-life in our hectic 21st century, it doesn’t feel like judicious crafting of the story.

Still, just as there are complex problems to deal with, Quinn shares how different skills and powers, along with simple gestures of kindness and patience and acceptance, and the profound courtesy of listening, might all be pathways toward healing.

“Angeline” was published by Ashland-based Blackstone Publishing.

This week’s book

“Angeline” by Anna Quinn

Blackstone Publishing — 292 pp — $25.99