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The Missing Mother of Rose Cottage
Not yet published
Expected 15 Jul 26She thought she knew her family. One photograph proves she has been living a lie.
Joanne has always believed her mother died giving birth to her. It’s a painful truth, but one she’s accepted. Then, whilst sorting through old baby clothes, she finds a photograph tucked away in a box—her birth mother, smiling and very much alive, cradling a newborn in her arms.
As Joanne starts searching, the answers she gets only lead to more questions. Her journey takes her to Rose Cottage, where her mother once lived, and into a past filled with long-hidden secrets. Can she find out what really happened? What could be so terrible that her father has kept it from her for her whole life—and is she ready for the truth?
Revised Previously released as The Secret of the Brighton House, this edition of The Missing Mother of Rose Cottage includes editorial revisions.
Joanne has always believed her mother died giving birth to her. It’s a painful truth, but one she’s accepted. Then, whilst sorting through old baby clothes, she finds a photograph tucked away in a box—her birth mother, smiling and very much alive, cradling a newborn in her arms.
As Joanne starts searching, the answers she gets only lead to more questions. Her journey takes her to Rose Cottage, where her mother once lived, and into a past filled with long-hidden secrets. Can she find out what really happened? What could be so terrible that her father has kept it from her for her whole life—and is she ready for the truth?
Revised Previously released as The Secret of the Brighton House, this edition of The Missing Mother of Rose Cottage includes editorial revisions.
311 pages, Kindle Edition
Expected publication July 15, 2026
3 people are currently reading
22 people want to read
About the author
Cathy Hayward
8 books102 followersI write historical fiction often set in dual timelines between the past and the present day. I love stories about family secrets and intrigue (think Kate Morton) which it why I write about them. My debut novel The Girl in the Maze comes out in autumn 2021
I trained as a journalist and edited a variety of trade publications, several of which were so niche they were featured on Have I Got News for You. I then moved into the world of PR and set up an award-winning communications agency Magenta Associates.
Devastated and inspired in equal measure by the death of my parents in quick succession, I completed The Creative Writing Programme with New Writing South out of which emerged my debut novel The Girl in the Maze about the experience of mothering and being mothered. It won Agora Books’ Lost the Plot Work in Progress Prize 2020 and was longlisted for the Grindstone Literary Prize 2020 and Flash500 2020.
When I'm not writing (or reading) in my local library, I love pottering in second-hand bookshops, hiking with my husband and our Hungarian Vizsla and wild camping. I live in Brighton – sandwiched between the Downs and the sea – with my husband, three children, dog and two rescue cats – one of whom thinks he’s a dog.
You can buy The Girl in the Maze here: https://linktr.ee/cathyhayward
And you can find out more about my writing journey here: https://cathyhayward.co.uk
Please do get in touch and ask me a question. I read (and respond) to all my reviews and love chatting to readers.
I trained as a journalist and edited a variety of trade publications, several of which were so niche they were featured on Have I Got News for You. I then moved into the world of PR and set up an award-winning communications agency Magenta Associates.
Devastated and inspired in equal measure by the death of my parents in quick succession, I completed The Creative Writing Programme with New Writing South out of which emerged my debut novel The Girl in the Maze about the experience of mothering and being mothered. It won Agora Books’ Lost the Plot Work in Progress Prize 2020 and was longlisted for the Grindstone Literary Prize 2020 and Flash500 2020.
When I'm not writing (or reading) in my local library, I love pottering in second-hand bookshops, hiking with my husband and our Hungarian Vizsla and wild camping. I live in Brighton – sandwiched between the Downs and the sea – with my husband, three children, dog and two rescue cats – one of whom thinks he’s a dog.
You can buy The Girl in the Maze here: https://linktr.ee/cathyhayward
And you can find out more about my writing journey here: https://cathyhayward.co.uk
Please do get in touch and ask me a question. I read (and respond) to all my reviews and love chatting to readers.
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Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
I loved the book. The plot was really original. There were some things in the start that made it hard for me to get into it but I ended up really enjoying the whole thing.
3.25⭐
3.25⭐
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