For a Girl: A true story of secrets, motherhood and hope

(Paperback)

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Description

I am by nature a private person. Secrets are different from privacy. They are things you are forced to keep to yourself, by family, friends, by your own shame. Secrets like these come to the surface one day and demand an airing.

Emerging from an unconventional, boisterously happy childhood, Mary-Rose MacColl was a rebellious teenager. And when, at the age of fifteen, her high-school teacher and her husband started inviting Mary-Rose to spend time with them, her parents were pleased that she now had the guidance she needed to take her safely into young adulthood.

It wasn't too long, though, before the teacher and her husband changed the nature of the relationship with overwhelming consequences for Mary-Rose. Consequences that kept her silent and ashamed through much of her adult life. Many years later, safe within a loving relationship, all of the long-hidden secrets and betrayals crashed down upon her and she came close to losing everything.

In this poignant and brave true story, Mary-Rose brings these secrets to the surface and, in doing so, is finally able to watch them float away.

Reviews

'Sometimes in this job I have the great privilege of reading books before they show their public face. It's a difficult time for a writer before a book comes out -- but can I just say that Mary-Rose MacColl's forthcoming memoir FOR A GIRL is one of the most remarkable pieces of writing I have read in a long, long time Lots of stuff gets over-praised these days I reckon, and readers tire of superlatives, but in this case, I'm bringing out every superlative I've got.' - Susan Johnson

Author Bio

Mary-Rose MacColl's first novel, No Safe Place, was runner-up in the 1995 The Australian/Vogel's Literary award and her first non-fiction book, The Birth Wars, was a finalist in the 2009 Walkley Awards. Her international bestselling In Falling Snow was published to great acclaim in 2012. Her fifth novel, Swimming Home, won The Courier-Mail 2016 People's Choice Queensland book of the Year Award. Mary-Rose lives in Brisbane, Australia with her husband and son.