The monk downstairs

"I don't need violin music," Rebecca Martin told an unhappy suitor. The phrase sums up her life at that point: at 38, alone, mother of a six-year-old daughter, and stuck in a job she disliked, Rebecca felt incapable of experiencing a light life again. Cautious, she didn't allow herself to entertain the hope of finding true love.

One Saturday morning, Rebecca receives a visit from a man willing to rent the guest apartment downstairs from her house, which had been vacant for a short time. Her new tenant is Michael Christopher, a man in his forties trying to adapt to the world after twenty years in a monastery. The conflict between the desire for a secluded and contemplative life and the need to actively participate in reality plunges the former monk's soul into doubt and incongruity.
The tension between Rebecca and Michael's feelings, as their closeness draws them ever closer, forces them both to fight the temptations that haunt them—he against the temptation to surrender; she, the temptation to hope. The Monk Downstairs is a tender story that grows intense as the richness of the emotions surrounding its characters is revealed.