Publisher's Synopsis
Time Tells Tales A Novel In Five Tales Set in Ireland and England in the early 1900's, covering a century, Time Tells Tales is a Novel in five parts or 'Tales'. They explore the history of three families; their interconnected lives are intricately woven together by love, birth, death, and marriage. These lives are spiced up by religion, revenge, scandal, abuse, heartache and spiritual intervention. The five Tales are told from different perspectives by the characters that drive this novel along to the surprising conclusion, spreading across time, space and dimensions, hence the title - Time Tells Tales. Theresa's Tale - Forbidden Love Theresa's Tale is the third tale of this novel and tells of forbidden love. She is the illegitimate daughter of Catherine and Alfred, raised by catholic nuns in an orphanage in County Kerry where she was born, cruelly taken from her mother before she had chance to even glimpse her bastard child. Theresa is a troubled child who is bullied and beaten by the Nuns who see her as a child that is no good, scarred and useless. The local priest who is attached to the church and the orphanage plays a big part in keeping this child from knowing her heritage and her parents as it is only him, Joseph Bennett, who has all the answers to all the secrets and lies. We follow Theresa as she is moved from home to home coping with abuse, lack of love or any true affection and generally having miserable existence. Theresa runs away to England, to London, looking for her best friend from her last 'home' David, and she is dragged into the world of prostitution and drugs, her only way to survive on the streets. A familiar face, her childhood abuser, rescues her! Theresa is pulled into another world of paedophilia and child slavery. She slowly plans to exact her revenge on the devil incarnate while helping as many of the kids that he rescues in the name of God, to escape their horrible fate. Theresa does this with the help of Brian and Mary, a brother and sister who befriend her. It is with Brian she has her first glimpse of what true love could be, but she worries that Brian will not be able to love her, an abused physiologically damaged middle-aged woman with no experience of a real loving relationship. In November 1999, just before the millennium, Theresa's plans come to a violent conclusion but with an unexpected twist. This Tale presents us with many more questions and few answers to the ever more complicated lives of these characters in Time Tells Tales. Will Theresa ever find out who her real parents are? Why was she left in the hands of those cruel nuns? What is true love and why would anyone want to love her? Will Theresa ever escape the hands of her abuser and save her mortal soul? Will Brian get passed her damaged persona and love her truly? Will she live to find answers to these questions? These and many more questions will be answered in this first novel by this new author, Stephanie Fletcher. For sure, Time certainly has some Tales to Tell.
