HER NAME IS ROSE
Christine Breen’s
debut novel, HER NAME IS ROSE (St Martin’s Press; July 26, 2016; paperback; $15.99) is an irresistible and moving tale
that explores
the depth of
a mother’s
love for
her
adopted daughter and the unique journey she feels she must take in order to bridge the past and
the future.
When Irish gardener Iris Bowen could not conceive a child,
she turned to an Irish adoption agency.
There she found a young American exchange student who wanted the best for
her
infant daughter, but had one request: that the child be named Rose. Now, Rose has grown and is stepping out on her own at the Royal Academy of Music
in London. Although a gifted violinist, she questions her talent as
she struggles to meet the impossible demands of
her brilliant but harsh teacher. Meanwhile, Iris has yet to fulfill her late husband’s
last
request that she find Rose’s birth mother, so that if anything happened
to Iris,
Rose would not be left alone in the world. However, when Iris
receives some worrisome results on a breast scan, her husband’s words
become hauntingly urgent.
Without telling her daughter, she embarks on
a voyage to
find Rose’s birth mother.
Since searches for
a birth mother are usually initiated by the adopted
child, Iris finds herself in a unique situation. With no records available to her and only a twenty-year-old envelope with a faded address to guide her, Iris begins a
journey into the past that takes her to Boston and back to the west of
Ireland, with surprising results for herself and for Rose and the others
whom their lives touch. Iris discovers just how connected the
world can be and how the world can feel much
smaller
thanks to love and music.
Written in
lyrical prose that brings
the music within its
pages to life, HER NAME IS ROSE is a gorgeous and intimate debut novel about the bond between a mother
and daughter, and
what happens when life does not play out the way you expect.
About the Author:
CHRISTINE BREEN
was born in
New
York and educated in Boston and Dublin, where she received
an MA
in Irish Literature. She is an artist,
homeopath, and garden designer whose columns on travel, gardening and health have appeared
in
newspapers and magazines in Ireland and America. She currently lives in Kiltumper,
Ireland with her husband,
the novelist Niall Williams,
in the cottage where her grandfather
was born. HER NAME IS ROSE is her first novel.