Monday, February 8, 2010

"Roses"

Leila Meacham is a writer and former teacher who lives in San Antonio, Texas.

Spanning the 20th century, her new novel Roses takes place in a small East Texas town against the backdrop of the powerful timber and cotton industries, industries controlled by the scions of the town's founding families. Cotton tycoon Mary Toliver and timber magnate Percy Warwick should have married but unwisely did not....

Meacham applied the Page 69 Test to Roses and reported the following:
Oddly--amazingly--Page 69 of Roses is a near enough summation of the novel's conflict. Mary is pitted against those she loves to preserve the family legacy of Somerset without realizing she is sacrificing her family to do so. Her brother Miles' dry statement to her: "Oh, I don't think you want to hear the consequences of that," pertains only to the moment at hand, but more broadly, it reflects Mary's flaw--her unwillingness to hear from anyone, not even herself, that her choices on behalf of Somerset will carry consequences she will someday bitterly regret.
Read an excerpt from Roses.

Learn more about Roses at the publisher's website, and visit the Roses Facebook fan page.

Visit the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue