The Rising Shore - Roanoke

In 1587, two English women board a ship to cross a treacherous ocean towards a land full of promise and danger. The Rising Shore - Roanoke is an historical fiction novel which sketches in possible answers to an old American mystery: what happened to the colony on Roanoke Island, Virginia? The author has chosen to explore this theme with a multiple viewpoint narrative. Elenor White, daughter of the expedition's chosen leader John White, hastily marries a bricklayer for the chance to join the company as lawful wife of a member. Elenor, an intelligent woman with the soul of an unfulfilled artist, sees Virginia as a land where she will be able to spread her wings and reach a potential denied to her in London by her gender. Her young serving girl, Margaret Lawrence, also believes that Virginia holds the key to bettering herself, not realizing that the land will tax her strength and her self in ways she cannot conceive. Strikingly, both women frequently refer to themselves in the third person, as if in their daily lives they are playing a role while their secret selves look on. Once the expedition reaches Virginia, all plans disintegrate as the little society fails to meet their expectations. The lazy are still lazy; and the greedy, the jealous, and the ambitious are still all of those things with greater intensity. The colonists' own faults are magnified by the smallness of the company and the extreme hardships and danger of the land, and soon, events are tumbling unstoppably toward the inevitable fate of the colony. Deborah Homsher has created a compelling historical fiction novel, through which we can glimpse the earliest ragged edge of recorded American history.

The Rising Shore Roanoke is a novel of the famous lost American colony, from the perspectives of two women who sailed from London to the shore of Virginia's wilderness in 1587. The adventurous daughter of the expedition's leader chafes at the societal restraints placed upon her gender, while her female servant dares to walk an independent path among the struggling colony. Their journey will take them through the Caribbean and climax in the Outer Banks region of North America. An enthralling saga of a colony presumed doomed, due to historical record of its founder's return from a three-year supply trip to find nothing left of the settlement except the word "Croatoan" carved on a post.

Inspired by true events concerning the first British attempt to establish a foothold in North America, Deborah Homsher's The Rising Shore:Roanoke presents a novel with compelling fictionalized details that probably surpass the actual facts that she briefly outlines in the book's postscript. The tale focuses on the 1587 Roanoke voyage that was commissioned by Sir Walter Raleigh in order to establish a permanent English settlement in North America. Roanoke Island is an island about twelve miles long and three miles wide and lies along the outer banks of present-day North Carolina and although its history is lesser known than Jamestown, its lessons probably helped establish the latter. Homsher's saga zeroes in on two strong-willed teenage women, Elenor White who was married to a brickmaker, Ananias Dare and Margaret Lawrence. These two women were part of the company of men, women, children and servants who set sail from London in April of 1587 to North America. The voyage would take them through the Caribbean and ultimately end up in the Outer Banks region. Elenor Dare was the daughter of John White, an artist of considerable merit and imagination. Raleigh had placed great trust in White's leadership and organizational abilities and as a result he also appointed him Governor of the new colony. It should be mentioned, as Homsher indicates in her postscript, that the skeleton of her novel is based on actual facts that were recorded by John White in letters to his patrons and illuminated by historians, notably David Beers Quinn. As for Lawrence, Homsher depicts her as Dare's servant based on the fact, as she mentions in the postscript, that if she were the same person mentioned in the actual list of women who were part of the company, she would have been slightly younger than Dare and unattached. As Homsher notes, "an unattached woman of that age was probably a servant." While the tale reflects Homsher's vivid imagination, it also raises some very interesting questions about the real lives of these two characters that came from very different backgrounds. Reading Homsher's yarn, we can't help wondering what motivated these women, as well as the others, to undertake such a venture when you consider, as we learn, that the settlers encountered all kinds of harrowing experiences including storms at sea, shortage of food supplies, inhospitable natives, mutiny, and sickness. And as for Elenor White Dare herself, it should be pointed out that she was pregnant throughout the voyage, eventually giving birth to the first English child born in North America. What is more, due to his apparent weak leadership, White encountered considerable difficulties with his men particularly with pilot Simon Fernandes who refused to transport the group to Chesapeake Bay where they were eventually planning to settle. Consequently,the group was forced to remain on Roanoke Island and as there were limited supplies, Governor White eventually was obliged to leave for E

For readers looking for a wild ride back in time, check out Homsher's new novel, The Rising Shore - Roanoke. Finally, we have a tale of adventure, intrigue, and harrowing survival written from the perspective of two women. The reasons why a servant and a middle class woman decide to risk their lives to cross the Atlantic demonstrate the author's attention to historical context and her skill in weaving the human, emotive aspects into that context. What is particularly convincing is the way that Homsher ensures that you, as a reader, experience the frustrating limitations on what women could do and the resourceful ways in which they persisted in exercising some autonomy. Finally, the novel offers stimulating speculation as to what might have really happened to the first colonists at Roanoke. A must read!

The Rising Shore --Roanoke is a riveting, skillful blend of imagination and history. From the plague-ravaged society of Elizabethan London to the wilds of unchartered Virginia, Homsher brings the past to life with an uncommon freshness and authencity. The voices of the adventure's two female narrators always ring true--so much so, that it takes only a few pages before the reader cares deeply about their fates. Captivating for its expert writing, deft portray of characters, historical detail and its ability to grab your emotions, The Rising Shore--Roanoke is a first-class work of fiction that deserves a wide audience.