• Newest Book

    THE PASSION OF MARTA

    Winner 2017 Nautilus Book Award

    Finalist National Indie Excellence Award

    Shortlist Chanticleer Goethe Award

    Finalist ’18 Sarton Women’s Book Award

    A young girl’s life changes forever when she goes down a forbidden path… toward an exquisite lady’s violin.  Powerful and moving; an opus of music, beauty, art, love and faith.

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Caren Simon Umbarger is a professional violinist and author of two award-winning novels.

Caren Umbarger attended Bennington College, earned a BA in violin performance from Hamline University, and has been a professional musician and string teacher for nearly 40 years.  Caren taught, performed and conducted in Minneapolis for three decades before moving to Florida in 2010.

Her first novel, COMING TO: A MIDWESTERN TALE won a 2011 Florida Book Award bronze medal for general fiction. Her second novel, THE PASSION OF MARTA, has received national and international acclaim.

She and her husband live, work and play in St. Augustine.

Bio

“The (Passion of Marta) plot, much like the form of a musical passion, unfolds in four parts, plus the prologue.  Each part speaks with a different voice, a different point of view, but each speaks for the violin and the power it holds to express beauty beyond belief. {…} A real treasure.”

        ~ Emily-Jane Hills Orford for Readers’ Favorite

Books

THE PASSION OF MARTA

Published: November, 2017

COMING TO: A MIDWESTERN TALE

Published: September, 2011

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