About the Book
Two Irish Catholic immigrants, Dominic Daley and James Halligan, were traveling west on the Boston Post Road, headed for New York. A man named Marcus Lyon was robbed and killed along the same road. Though the two Irishmen denied any knowledge of the crime, they were arrested and accused of the murder. They spent five months in jail. Only two days before their trial they were allowed to consult with a lawyer. The trial, a mockery of justice, lasted only one day. The two were sentenced to be hanged by the neck and, as the presiding judge said, "their bodies dissected and anatomized."
Father Cheverus, an emigre priest from France and one of only two Roman Catholic priests in all of New England at the time, is asked by Daley's wife and mother to go to the cell to comfort them, listen to their confessions, offer them communion. Father Cheverus, who escaped the Terror of the French Revolution, is a man plagued by his own past. Daley, a simple family man with a young son, and Halligan, a slick type with a checkered past and a lost love, face their deaths bravely, only to be exonerated in 1984.
Michael White has used his considerable talent to capture the political, social and cultural aspects of New England. In this heartbreaking story, he shows that the anti-Catholic and anti-foreign sentiments of that period in some ways reflect ongoing prejudice today.
About the Author :
Michael C. White, who teaches at Fairfield University, is the author of three novels, including the" New York Times "Notable Book "A Brother's Blood." He lives in Massachusetts with his wife and two children.
Review :
"A meticulously researched and richly drawn portrait of the lives of two Irish-Catholic immigrants and their priest. Michael C. White has delivered a historical novel of lasting contemporary resonance."--A. Manette Ansay, author of Vinegar Hill
"Michael White's new novel, The Garden of the Martyrs, is everything a historical novel, or any novel, should be--rich in its characters and setting, compelling in its drama, and utterly true in its deepest emotions and ideology."--Richard Russo, author of Empire Falls (winner of the Pulitzer Prize)
"What strikes me most about this wonderful novel by Michael White is the authenticity of place and character....the reader is transported in time....An absorbing and engrossing novel...."--Anita Shreve, author of The Pilot's Wife
"The detail...is rich in historical resonance."
"Writing with a good feel for the period, White manages to get the history right and keep the narrative taut at the same time."
"Michael White's new novel, "The Garden of the Martyrs," is everything a historical novel, or any novel, should be--rich in its characters and setting, compelling in its drama, and utterly true in its deepest emotions and ideology." - Richard Russo, author of "Empire Falls" (winner of the Pulitzer Prize)
"What strikes me most about this wonderful novel by Michael White is the authenticity of place and character. It's not so much that White has done his homework about early 19th century anti-Irish sentiment and a gross miscarriage of justice (and he has!--the history is deeply felt, not merely reported); it's that the reader is transported in time so thoroughly that I, too, was walking the streets of Boston and Northampton. An absorbing and engrossing novel by one of our finest novelists today." - Anita Shreve, author of "The Pilot's Wife"
"A meticulously researched and richly drawn portrait of the lives of two Irish-Catholic immigrants and their priest. Michael C. White has delivered a historical novel of lasting contemporary resonance." - A. Manette Ansay, author of "Vinegar Hill"
"In this powerhouse novel, master storyteller Michael C. White brings to urgent life a historic murder case rife with timeless moral questions. In his commanding narrative and rich visceral descriptions, White transports the reader to Boston, 1806: its backroads and churches and seats of power; even, in scenes of stunning immediacy, its gallows. Both sweeping and intimate, "The Garden of Martyrs" reaches deep inside three men as each seeks his separate peace."- Elizabeth Searle, author of "A Four-Sided Bed "and" Celebrities in Disgrace"
"Painstakingly researched, expertly told," The Garden of Martyrs "is a gripping, wonderful novel. Writing about one terrible injustice, Michael White brings to life the history of several cultures, and, in the process, takes us on a wise, honest, unflinching tour of the human soul."
- Roland Merullo, author of" In Revere, Inc
