You may recognize these roses from the cover of Necessary Sins. This isn’t technically a Noisette rose as featured in my novels–my cover designer and I couldn’t find a stock image of one–but this variety has the same look, and it dates to 1828. Antoine Jacques, head gardener for the duc d’Orléans in France, named this rose Félicité Perpétue after his twin daughters, Félicité and Perpétue (source: Douglas Brenner and Stephen Scanniello, A Rose by Any Name, 2009). The gardener’s twins were named after two North African Christian martyrs. I think my fictional priest Father Joseph Lazare would approve. 😉
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