Susan Marlene
Book Review & Author Interview
Devotions & Short Stories
Writers & Pens
GLIMPSING HISTORICAL TIMES
​Timeless Significance For Every Day
Short stories and also devotions that mix historical quotes and contemporary musings, as well as
​author interviews and book reviews.
A NAME UNKNOWN by Roseanna M. White
Greetings Roseanna!
You are a delightful writer and a favorite for me! I applaud your excellence and imagination! I always look forward to one of your reads! :)
Yes, Roseanna, how does someone steal a family's history and their name? What a fun adventure to read! This unique 1914 London, England historical delighted me through and through!
Rosemary Gresham is the protagonist who stole my heart, and not just like any common thief, but one who captured my full admiration and sympathy! Anyone who knows me would gasp to read this declaration for I don't condone stealing. So, if you want to know why I highly recommend this novel—I suggest that you purchase a copy or request it at your local library. 😊
Peter Holstein—the romantic interest and family member with the name at risk—has secrets of his own and Rosemary is out to find them. This novel has a personality and freshness that appeals to me. I find the diverse characters amusing and or entertaining and can say they are perfectly fitted for the intrigue that began brewing near the onset of the World War I. I delight to share this wonderful novel and would be thrilled if you came back and told me how you felt about it also!
Questions for Roseanna:
How did you stumble upon the idea of having a thief for the protagonist of this novel? (I'm so glad you did since you did share Miss Rosemary with us!)
The credit for that goes to my best friend/critique partner, Stephanie. She'd been working on a story about a thief, and it was so much fun to read! I began wondering how the life of a street thief might change during the Great War. Of course, I would want a noble thief. One with a big family she was fighting for. And one who found herself engaged in a task far bigger than merely stealing…from there, the idea just snowballed!
What time period do you like best of all? I adore your Culpur Ring series.
This is always a tough question for me! Honestly, I just adore history. Each era has its unique characteristics that set it apart and make it come alive. I love learning what those things are and diving into different periods. That said, I've also enjoyed really digging deep into one era with my books for Bethany House and not having to completely restart my research on each book, LOL.
I appreciate how you brought out the strengths in the hero that some would pass over and ignore. How did you come up with anonymously written stories! I love this thread of Peter's story! How perfectly it fit and moved with this story.
When I got the first inkling of who Peter Holstein would be, I knew only that he would be of German descent and consider changing his last name, as the royal family of England ended up doing. But as I kept reading up on the unexpected effects of the war, I also saw that novelists played a role I'd never realized, and I definitely wanted to feature that! (No spoilers, LOL.) So I decided that Peter needed to be a writer. But that, if his surname caused him problems enough that he was considering changing it, he certainly couldn't write under it. Hence, the need for a pen name.
What theme would you like your readers to benefit from with this novel and/or with your novels in general?
A theme that I highlight in A Name Unknown and in many of my stories is that our true identity rests in the Lord. When we feel like we don't know who we are in the world, the best way to discover it is to find who we are in Him. When we rest secure in our faith and explore the path He's called us to, then our place in this world around us solidifies too—because we're going about His business.
What is your favorite scene from the beginning of this novel?
I enjoyed pitting these two very different characters against each other all through the book, but I had especial fun in the scene where they went to St. Michael's Mount. My family had the pleasure of visiting this castle in the sea, and as we drove the same roads they would have driven, I could just imagine Rosemary and Peter's dialogue—and of course, had to make them constantly challenging each other with their oh-so-different views of the world!
What is the next novel on your publisher's schedule?
With the final book in the Shadows Over England Series now out in the world (An Hour Unspent), my attention is now on the next series I'm writing for Bethany House, The Codebreakers. I've just turned in my revised manuscript for book one, The Number of Love, and am diving into the writing of book 2, currently titles The Wings of Devotion. Readers of the Shadows Over England and Ladies of the Manor Series will recognize the characters and settings, but The Codebreakers focuses on the intelligence wing of the Admiralty in England during the Great War, combining the escapades of the secret agents with the mind-power of the codebreakers. It's proven to be great fun thus far! The series will begin in June of 2019.
Roseanna M. White is a bestselling, Christy Award nominated author who has long claimed that words are the air she breathes. When not writing fiction, she's homeschooling her two kids, editing, designing book covers, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna is the author of a slew of historical novels that span several continents and thousands of years. Spies and war and mayhem always seem to find their way into her books…to offset her real life, which is blessedly ordinary. You can learn more about her and her stories at www.RoseannaMWhite.com.
Susan Marlene is published on www.ChristianDevotions.us and in Splickety Love Magazine, The Novice and newspapers. She writes devotions, fiction, and nonfiction. She is a member and co-founder of Pens of Praise Christian Writers
Group. She is a member of American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW). She speaks at writers groups and prepares devotions and teachings often for Pens of Praise Christian Writers, and was a former member of Jerry Jenkins Writers Guild. She is a wife, mother, grandmother and Alternative Education Teacher's Aide. She loves antiques and misses her Leonberger, but loves her Boxer who fills their lives with love and laughter. Her cat is queen of the house and thinks she has everyone under control. Wink!