I'm delighted to welcome Tina Pritchard to my blog today. Find all about her book, The Sea Glass Beach, and read an extract.
The
Sea Glass Beach
In
1950’s southern Ireland, single mother Theresa gives birth to a child she names
Roisin. Arrangements are in hand for the adoption when Theresa changes her
mind. The child, gifted and intuitive, is viewed by the local community as
‘odd’. Reeling from the news of Roisin’s heart-breaking expulsion from convent
school, Theresa makes a momentous decision. To protect her daughter, she must
send her away.
Canada’s wild beauty serves as a backdrop to a year of challenges for Roisin.
She encounters trauma and devastating loss, but also gains a new family and
finds love with the enigmatic Cal. Death, grief and culpability are potent
forces she must somehow come to terms with. Can a tiny model boat unshackle her
from her past and help her journey into a hopeful future?
Purchase Links
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0BMJR3ZT3
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BMJR3ZT3
Author
Bio – Tina Pritchard spent most of her life engaged in
bringing up a family, taking a social science degree, working as a lecturer, a
trainer and more recently as an independent celebrant conducting funerals,
weddings and naming ceremonies. Her first book, a psychological thriller, In A Deep Dark Wood, was published in
2021. The Sea Glass Beach is a
departure in genre and started life as a short story morphing over the years
into a novel. It is a work of fiction inspired in part by her own mother’s
experience of giving birth to a child at Sean Ross Abbey Mother and Baby Home
in the 1950’s. That child, born all those years ago in Co Tipperary, Ireland,
is the author of this book.
Tina loves to write and has won competitions for both her short stories and her poetry. She lives in a beautiful part of the world and gains much of her inspiration from walking her badly behaved terrier, Horace, in the Derbyshire countryside.
To give you a taster of Tina Pritchard's writing style, here is a short extract from the book:
[This extract reflects Roisin’s love of running in the forest close to her home in Ireland and her affinity with the natural world.]
Pausing to rest on the grassy bank, she dipped a foot into the icy, crystal-clear water. High in the branches of a solitary Scots pine, she heard the churr of a nightjar, the rare, ghostly sound rising and falling in the air and echoing through the trees. As the water trickled over her toes, she remembered her mother's warnings. Theresa was forever telling her she had one pair of feet and they had to last her a lifetime. Being barefoot, she warned, meant possible injury from sharp stones, discarded broken bottles or pieces of metal. With her feet cut to ribbons there would be no more running. ‘Then what would you do, Macushla?’ she would say.
Occupying Roisin’s thoughts this evening were less mundane matters. She was looking forward to the time of bounty soon to come. Then she would arrive home with her pockets full of nature’s gifts. These would be placed on her night stand: alder cones, ash keys, beech nuts, polished conkers and acorns that turned from bright green to brown before separating from their cupules. Toys were of little interest. Her playthings were the treasures provided by the natural world.
As the days grew shorter, Theresa would draw the curtains and light the oil lamp. Sitting together at the scrubbed table, Roisin would study the colour plates in her book of native trees and birds as her mother caught up with her sewing. She was aware she was different, having never encountered anyone who liked the same things as her. The girls at school weren’t disagreeable, but they did treat her as a novelty. They thought her amusing, especially when she got up the noses of the teachers or Father Kelly. She didn’t really mind being the centre of attention, as long as it was on her terms. She had little in common with the other girls and it wasn’t of real concern to her. She preferred to observe and listen.
No comments:
Post a Comment