The South Carolina Environmental Law Project (SCELP) is honored to host a luncheon celebrating the launch of New York Times bestselling author Mary Alice Monroe's newest novel, Where the Rivers Merge, on Wednesday, May 14, 2025 from 12-2pm at The Oaks Dining Room in the Belfair Club House (200 Belfair Oaks Boulevard, Bluffton).
Join us to hear Mary Alice read from her latest book championing the spirited 88-year-old Eliza Rivers’ tenacious efforts to protect the land she loves and calls home from her only child’s sense of entitlement. This highly anticipated novel is a celebration of the land and spirit of the early twentieth-century Lowcountry and drives home the need to safeguard and protect it for future generations - something that we work towards every day here at SCELP. Guests also will bear witness to the passion that drives SCELP’s executive director, Amy Armstrong, to use her legal expertise to protect South Carolina's beautiful spaces.
Tickets to this book launch luncheon are $125, which includes a copy of Where the Rivers Merge, and a chance to name a character in Mary Alice Monroe’s next novel! Proceeds benefit the work of the South Carolina Environmental Law Project.
Questions about the event? Contact Development Operations Manager Tara Stevenson by emailing tara@scelp.org or calling (843) 527-0078.
About The Book
1908: The Lowcountry of South Carolina is at the cusp of change. Mayfield, the grand estate held for generations by the Rivers family, is the treasured home of young Eliza. Free spirited, she refuses to be confined by societal norms. Instead, Eliza revels in exploring the golden fields and sparkling ponds of Mayfield, observing wildlife, and riding horses.
But her halcyon days are cut short by the Great War, coastal storms, and unexpected challenges to Mayfield. As Eliza battles personal pains and the ravages of family turmoil over the years, her love and devotion for the natural world puts her on a collision course with the patriarchal traditions of a bygone era.
1988: At 88, Eliza is the scion of the Rivers/DeLancey family. She’s fought a lifetime to save her beloved Mayfield and is too independent and committed to quietly retire and leave the fate of the estate to her greedy son. She must make decisions that will assure the future of the land and her family—or watch them both be split apart.
Set against the evocative landscape of the twentieth-century American South, Where the Rivers Merge is a dramatic and sweeping multigenerational family story of unyielding love, lessons learned, profound sacrifices, and the indomitable spirit of a woman determined to persevere in the face of change in order to protect her family legacy and the land she loves.
