Secret Life of Dorothy Soames

“Far from growing up in the wealthy, fox-hunting circles . . .her mother had in fact been raised in a foundling hospital for the children of unwed women.” —Editor’s Choice, The New York Times Book Review

Justine Cowan’s remarkable true story begins when she found her often volatile mother in an unlit room writing a name over and over again, one that she had never heard before and would not hear aga...