About this item
The United States Congress in 1929 passed legislation to fund travel for mothers of the fallen soldiers of World War I to visit their sons' graves in France. Over the next three years, 6,693 Gold Star Mothers made the trip. In this emotionally charged, brilliantly realized novel, April Smith breathes life into a unique moment in American history, imagining the experience of five of these women.They are strangers at the start, but their lives will become inextricably intertwined, altered in indelible ways. These very different Gold Star Mothers travel to the Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery to say final good-byes to their sons and come together along the way to face the unexpected: a death, a scandal, and a secret revealed. None of these pilgrims will be as affected as Cora Blake, who has lived almost her entire life in a small fishing village off the coast of Maine, caring for her late sister's three daughters, hoping to fill the void left by the death of her son, Sammy, who was killed on a scouting mission during the final days of the war.
About the Author
Yes, I'm the same April Smith who writes the FBI Special Agent Ana Grey Mystery/Thrillers but I've taken a new direction into suspenseful historical fiction. My latest novel, HOME SWEET HOME, takes place in 1950s South Dakota, where a family becomes the victim of a witch hunt during the McCarthy era. A STAR FOR MRS. BLAKE, set in the 1930s, tells the untold true story of the Gold Star Mothers pilgrimages to Europe to visit the graves of their loved ones killed during WWI. Where do I get such wide-ranging ideas? I grew up in the Bronx, New York, where the Kingsbridge Road Branch public library was the center of my universe. There it was safe and warm -- the library was a tiny space above a dry cleaners -- and I was free to explore everything from science fiction to James Bond. I moved to Los Angeles to write for TV shows like Cagney and Lacey, but I am still, firmly and forever, happy in the world of books.
