After publishing five nonfiction books, I had the yearning to write a novel. Ninety-eight thousand words later, the novel is complete, and on the shelves in bookstores. I'm already working on the sequel.
Set in England and Scotland during the mid 1600s, the story is fast paced, dark and edgy in places. It is loosely based on an intriguing Scottish legend that I remember well from my childhood growing up in England. Most believed the legend to be true, including my grandmother who would fearfully whisper the names of the wicked individuals. As an adult, I researched the story and realized there may be some truth to the legend. Indeed, the BBC did a documentary about it and tried to find the subterranean cave that is a key part of the story.
Synopsis
As a child, Catherine MacDonald was left at a priory by her mother who never returns to claim her. As an adult, Catherine becomes a nun, but a chance meeting at Hadleigh Castle with the Earl of Essex and a strange young girl, changes Catherine's life forever. She is determined to find her mother, and sets off for Scotland. During her journey, she sees the injustices of life outside the cloistered priory; the downtrodden and the poor, those afflicted with leprosy and the plague. She witnesses the desperation a woman feels when she has no man to support her, and realizes that one mistake can change a woman's life forever – perhaps a woman just like her mother.
At the conclusion, Catherine learns the bitter truth about her mother’s life. She is devastated by the discovery, and wonders how she will ever overcome the horrifying legacy.
Woven into the story are actual historical events and people such as Lawrence Washington, great-great-grandfather of President George Washington, the Sherman family in the County of Essex and Reverend Mompesson in Eyam, Derbyshire.
ISBN 978-1-935605-34-8.
For more information please go to: http://www.evwallace.com/
