Book Review: "A Name Unknown" by Roseanna M. White

​            I became acquainted with Roseanna White at the beginning of August, when she wrote to me asking for stock images she could use in her business of creating cover art for books.  When I learned that besides crafting covers for other authors she also writes books herself, I proposed a trade: one of my books for one of hers.  I sent her Delivery Delayed and she sent me A Name Unknown, her novel of a professional thief who has been asked to determine a man's loyalties on the eve of war in 1914.  Her book is one deeply infused with its author's Christian faith.
            A Name Unknown is both a romance and an exploration of what faith might mean to people of differing life experiences.  As the story opens, the very first sentence tells the reader that Rosemary Gresham is a thief, but "a thief who preferred to work in broad daylight."  Thus, from the very start we are introduced to the protagonist as a sinner, yet we are also given a symbolic hint that privately she yearns for Light.  Thus, the stage is set for an ongoing conflict throughout the story: Rosemary's experiences with the things she feels she must do to survive in a harsh world, versus her complicated relationship with a God she fears has forsaken her.  The mysterious Mr. V. (an enigmatic figure with shades of James Bond's M) charges Rosemary with a task arguably more suited to a spy than a thief: to investigate the reclusive Peter Holstein and discover whether his loyalties lie with the country of his ancestors or the land he has made his home.  In the course of this asignment she finds herself drawn to Peter and to the redeeming powers of the Christian faith which permeates everything about him —for he is, indeed, loyal to England, but his deeper loyalty is to Christ.
            By vocation Peter is a novelist, specializing in adventure stories which might be considered Christian alternatives to Haggard's works, or pious precursors to Indiana Jones' adventures.  The scenes where Peter is contemplating his craft or considering the motivations of his characters were my favorite portions of the book; to a writer there is something very familiar about them.  An author's fictional characters become our friends as we bring them into being, and we're very protective of them.  White shows this beautifully in Peter's intense shyness about letting others see his work in progress, and the true pain he feels when his stories are criticized.  When he slowly opens up to Rosemary and willingly discusses his stories with her, it represents a deepening intimacy between them.  Every born wordsmith can empathize with a description of Peter in Chapter twenty-seven: "Writing was who he was, how he best communicated."[1]  Peter's identity as a writer is all the more important to him because he suffers from a speech impediment.  He might easily be considered an embodiment of the words of Lady Blessington: "Thoughts come maimed and plucked of plumage from the lips, which, from the pen, in the silence of your own leisure and study, would be born with far more beauty."  Peter's writings express the words his stuttering tongue is is unable to utter, and the characters in his books say the things he cannot.  Verily, he is a writer well-drawn.
            The book does take some rather broad artistic liberties, such as when characters are described as too poor to have access to paper —in an era when cheap paper had become so ubiquitous that parcels were wrapped in it.  In one scene a dozen oil lamps are used to light a single room, which would be a number sufficient to illuminate a fair-sized church given the brightness of the center draft lamps which were already becoming old-fashioned by 1914.  The scene involving an arrow would raise some eyebrows amongst my old archery club friends, and Gabriel's library school professors would doubtless have some things to say about the portrayal of historical attitudes towards women in their profession.  But, ultimately it's not a book about such things.  It's a book about faith, and about the relationships between people.
         When Rosemary enters Peter's life she plays the role of a private archivist, organizing his library.  His writing space is in the adjoining room; they are each aware of the other's close presence but there is a closed door between them.  Gradually, this and other barriers are breached; the door is opened more and more frequently, and separation becomes collaboration.  In a way, all good relationships are like this: what starts as two joins together to become one.
         A Name Unknown is the first book in Roseanna White's Shadows Over England series, and is published by Bethany House, a division of Baker Publishing Group.  It is available through Target, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and the Christian booksellers Lifeway, CBD, and Parable.
         Roseanna and I will be talking via Facebook Live on Monday, September 24th at 4 p.m.  I hope some of you can join us!


[1] I particularly smiled at this because it reminded me so strongly of something I had written about Felix in A Trip and aTumble.  Both characters are true writers down to their bones, though they are otherwise so very different.