The Rowans (Paperback)

One morning in 1750, in the kitchen of a house on a coastal farm, Tamsin Bennett is stricken with a ghastly vision of her Papa. That day inexplicably he is found dead under the wheel of the tide mill. In peril, Tamsin must flee the farm, leave Grandmother Cat and the cousin she loves, and go with her mother to a place that may be safe – or not.

Now keeping an inn and tavern in a harbor town, Tamsin hides in plain sight to carry on the healing work of her foremothers. Trained in the ancient lineage of the Rowan women, she mixes extracts to put into the tavern’s ale, alters food with herbs, protects her family from threat, and chooses her lovers with particular care.

The Rowans is a historical novel woven with magical realism, inspired by a woman who started her own business in 1752, of necessity.

Beverly Cooper Pierce has been an academic librarian, registered nurse in the field of holistic care, family historian, and professional writer, all braiding now into her debut novel, The Rowans. Growing up in Salem, Massachusetts, she had no idea that John and Elizabeth Proctor, both convicted of witchcraft in 1692, were her seven-times great-grandparents, or that some of the oldest houses in towns along the coast held stories of her father's family. After living in Minnesota many years and bringing two sons into the next generation, she now lives and writes north of Boston on Cape Ann, where the bones of her novel are familial and real. She is at work on a sequel set in Maine.