In her twenties, Belle da Costa Greene is hired by J. P. Morgan to curate a collection of rare manuscripts, books, and artwork for his newly built Pierpont Morgan Library. Belle becomes a fixture on the New York society scene and one of the most powerful people in the art and book world, known for her impeccable taste and shrewd negotiating for critical works as she helps build a world-class collection.
But Belle has a secret, one she must protect at all costs. She was born not Belle da Costa Greene but Belle Marion Greener. She is the daughter of Richard Greener, the first Black graduate of Harvard and a well-known advocate for equality. Belle's complexion isn't dark because of her alleged Portuguese heritage that lets her pass as white--her complexion is dark because she is African American.
The Personal Librarian tells the story of an extraordinary woman, famous for her intellect, style, and wit, and shares the lengths to which she must go--for the protection of her family and her legacy--to preserve her carefully crafted white identity in the racist world in which she lives.
Publisher: n/a
|
9780593101537
|
Hardcover
The Paris Library
By Charles, Janet Skeslien
Based on the true World War II story of the heroic librarians at the American Library in Paris, this is an unforgettable story of romance, friendship, family, and the power of literature to bring us together, perfect for fans of The Lilac Girls and The Paris Wife. Paris, 1939: Young and ambitious Odile Souchet has it all: her handsome police officer beau and a dream job at the American Library in Paris. When the Nazis march into Paris, Odile stands to lose everything she holds dear, including her beloved library. Together with her fellow librarians, Odile joins the Resistance with the best weapons she has: books. But when the war finally ends, instead of freedom, Odile tastes the bitter sting of unspeakable betrayal. Montana, 1983: Lily is a lonely teenager looking for adventure in small-town Montana.
Publisher: n/a
|
9781982134198
|
Hardcover
All Our Shimmering Skies
By Dalton, Trent
From the internationally bestselling and beloved author of the critically acclaimed Boy Swallows Universe, a mesmerizing, uplifting novel of adventure and unlikely friendships in World War II Australia - calling to mind The Wizard of Oz as directed by Baz Luhrmann.Darwin, 1942. As Japanese bombs rain down on her hometown, newly orphaned Molly Hook looks to the skies and runs for her life. Inside a duffel bag, she carries a stone heart and a map that will lead her to Longcoat Bob, the deep-country sorcerer whom she believes cursed her family. Accompanying her are the most unlikely traveling companions: Greta, a razor-tongued actress, and Yukio, a Japanese fighter pilot who's abandoned his post. With messages from the skies above to guide them towards treasure, but foes close on their trail, the trio will encounter the beauty and vastness of the Northern Territory and survive in ways they never thought possible.
Publisher: n/a
|
9780063092754
|
Hardcover
Paris Never Leaves You
By Feldman, Ellen
"Masterful. Magnificent. A passionate story of survival and a real page turner. This story will stay with me for a long time." -- Heather Morris, author of The Tattooist of Auschwitz and Cilka's JourneyLiving through World War II working in a Paris bookstore with her young daughter, Vivi, and fighting for her life, Charlotte is no victim, she is a survivor. But can she survive the next chapter of her life?Alternating between wartime Paris and 1950s New York publishing, Ellen Feldman's Paris Never Leaves You is an extraordinary story of resilience, love, and impossible choices, exploring how survival never comes without a cost.The war is over, but the past is never past.
Publisher: n/a
|
9781250759894
|
Hardcover
The Book of Lost Names
By Harmel, Kristin
Inspired by an astonishing true story from World War II, a young woman with a talent for forgery helps hundreds of Jewish children flee the Nazis in this unforgettable historical novel from the international bestselling author of the "epic and heart-wrenching World War II tale" (Alyson Noel, #1 New York Times bestselling author) The Winemaker's Wife.Eva Traube Abrams, a semi-retired librarian in Florida, is shelving books one morning when her eyes lock on a photograph in a magazine lying open nearby. She freezes; it's an image of a book she hasn't seen in sixty-five years - a book she recognizes as The Book of Lost Names. The accompanying article discusses the looting of libraries by the Nazis across Europe during World War II - an experience Eva remembers well - and the search to reunite people with the texts taken from them so long ago.
Publisher: n/a
|
9781982131890
|
Hardcover
The Forest of Vanishing Stars
By Harmel, Kristin
After being stolen from her wealthy German parents and raised in the unforgiving wilderness of eastern Europe, a young woman finds herself alone in 1941 after her kidnapper dies. Her solitary existence is interrupted, however, when she happens upon a group of Jews fleeing the Nazi terror. Stunned to learn what's happening in the outside world, she vows to teach the group all she can about surviving in the forest - and in turn, they teach her some surprising lessons about opening her heart after years of isolation.
Publisher: n/a
|
9781982158934
|
Book
The Diplomat's Wife
By Jenoff, Pam
How have I been lucky enough to come here, to be alive, when so many others are not? I should have died.… But I am here.1945. Surviving the brutality of a Nazi prison camp, Marta Nederman is lucky to have escaped with her life. Recovering from the horror, she meets Paul, an American soldier who gives her hope of a happier future. But their plans to meet in London are dashed when Paul's plane crashes.Devastated and pregnant, Marta marries Simon, a caring British diplomat, and glimpses the joy that home and family can bring. But her happiness is threatened when she learns of a Communist spy in British intelligence, and that the one person who can expose the traitor is connected to her past.
Publisher: n/a
|
9780778325123
|
Paperback
The Woman with the Blue Star
By Jenoff, Pam
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Lost Girls of Paris comes a riveting tale of unfathomable sacrifice and unlikely friendship during World War II.1942. Sadie Gault is eighteen and living with her parents amid the horrors of the Krak -- w Ghetto during World War II. When the Nazis liquidate the ghetto, Sadie and her pregnant mother are forced to seek refuge in the perilous sewers beneath the city. One day Sadie looks up through a grate and sees a girl about her own age buying flowers.Ella Stepanek is an affluent Polish girl living a life of relative ease with her stepmother, who has developed close alliances with the occupying Germans. Scorned by her friends and longing for her fianc, who has gone off to war, Ella wanders Krak -- w restlessly.
Publisher: n/a
|
9780778311546
|
Hardcover(Original)
The Metal Heart
By Lea, Caroline
"The story of true innocents caught up in the machinery of war. Exquisitely researched, beautifully told, this tiny corner of Scotland came alive for me in all of my senses and I found myself rooting for the central characters with all my heart." - Mary Beth Keane, author of Ask Again, YesIn the dark days of World War II, an unlikely romance blossoms between a Scottish woman and an Italian prisoner of war in this haunting novel with the emotional complexity of The Boat Runner and All the Light We Cannot See - a powerful and atmospheric story of love, jealousy, and conscience that illuminates the beauty of the human spirit from the author of The Glass Woman.In the wake of the Allies' victory in North Africa, 500 Italian soldiers have been sent to a remote island off the Scottish coast to wait out the war.
Publisher: n/a
|
9780063090668
|
Paperback
The Last Bookshop in London
By Martin, Madeline
Inspired by the true World War II history of the few bookshops to survive the Blitz, The Last Bookshop in London is a timeless story of wartime loss, love and the enduring power of literature.August 1939: London prepares for war as Hitler's forces sweep across Europe. Grace Bennett has always dreamed of moving to the city, but the bunkers and blackout curtains that she finds on her arrival were not what she expected. And she certainly never imagined she'd wind up working at Primrose Hill, a dusty old bookshop nestled in the heart of London.Through blackouts and air raids as the Blitz intensifies, Grace discovers the power of storytelling to unite her community in ways she never dreamed - a force that triumphs over even the darkest nights of the war.
Publisher: n/a
|
9781335653048
|
Hardcover
The Rose Code
By Quinn, Kate
The New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of The Huntress and The Alice Network returns with another heart-stopping World War II story of three female code breakers at Bletchley Park and the spy they must root out after the war is over.1940. As England prepares to fight the Nazis, three very different women answer the call to mysterious country estate Bletchley Park, where the best minds in Britain train to break German military codes. Vivacious debutante Osla is the girl who has everything - beauty, wealth, and the dashing Prince Philip of Greece sending her roses - but she burns to prove herself as more than a society girl, and puts her fluent German to use as a translator of decoded enemy secrets. Imperious self-made Mab, product of east-end London poverty, works the legendary codebreaking machines as she conceals old wounds and looks for a socially advantageous husband.
Publisher: n/a
|
9780063059412
|
Hardcover
The Warsaw Orphan
By Rimmer, Kelly
"Kelly Rimmer's heart-stopping rendering of the war in Nazi-occupied Poland - of life, resistance, survival, and love - will captivate readers page by page ... A carefully researched portrayal of history's darkest hours and one orphan's search for her place in the world." - Lisa Wingate, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Before We Were Yours"A surefire hit [and] a heartbreaking and hopeful story of family, duty, love, salvation, and resistance. The Warsaw Orphan will bring tears to your eyes with its authentically woven complications, moral dilemmas, and unavoidable truths. A thoughtful, beautiful novel." -- Kristin Harmel, New York Times bestselling author of The Book of Lost NamesInspired by the real-life heroine who saved thousands of Jewish children during WWII, The Warsaw Orphan is Kelly Rimmer's most anticipated novel since her bestselling sensation, The Things We Cannot Say.
Publisher: n/a
|
9781525811531
|
Hardcover
Our Darkest Night
By Robson, Jennifer
To survive the Holocaust, a young Jewish woman must pose as a Christian farmer's wife in this unforgettable novel from USA Today bestselling author Jennifer Robson - a story of terror, hope, love, and sacrifice, inspired by true events, that vividly evokes the most perilous days of World War II.It is the autumn of 1943, and life is becoming increasingly perilous for Italian Jews like the Mazin family. With Nazi Germany now occupying most of her beloved homeland, and the threat of imprisonment and deportation growing ever more certain, Antonina Mazin has but one hope to survive - to leave Venice and her beloved parents and hide in the countryside with a man she has only just met.Nico Gerardi was studying for the priesthood until circumstances forced him to leave the seminary to run his family's farm.
Publisher: n/a
|
9780063059405
|
Hardcover
The Yellow Bird Sings
By Rosner, Jennifer
The girl is forbidden from making a sound, so the yellow bird sings. He sings whatever the girl composes in her head: high-pitched trills of piccolo; low-throated growls of contrabassoon. The bird chirps all the musical parts save percussion, because the barn rabbits obligingly thump their back feet like bass drums, like snares.Music helps the flowers bloom. When the daisies grow abundant, the bird weaves a garland for the girl to wear on her head like a princess -- though no one can see. She must hide from everyone in the village: soldiers, the farmhouse boys, the neighbors too. The lady with squinty eyes and blocky shoes just dragged a boy down the street and returned, proud and straight-backed, cradling a sack of sugar like a baby. -- The Yellow Bird SingsWhat would happen if your five-year-old child was a musical prodigy who could hear symphonies in her head What if you had to keep her silent and hidden for months during wartime in German-occupied Poland After all of the Jews in their town are rounded up and killed during WWII, Rza and her daughter, Shira, find themselves hiding in a farmer's barn. Shira has difficulty staying still and quiet, as music pulses inside her. To pass the time, Rza tells Shira a story: There is a little girl who, with the help of her yellow bird, tends an enchanted garden. The garden must be kept silent -- only the bird can sing the girl's musical compositions -- and together the girl and her bird avert many threats. Thus Rza manages to soothe Shira and shield her from the horrors around them. But then the day comes when their haven is no longer safe and Rza must face an impossible choice: whether to keep Shira by her side, or give her the chance to survive apart.The Yellow Bird Sings is a powerful, beautiful, heartrending novel about the unbreakable bond between a mother and a daughter, and the triumph of hope and beauty even in the darkest of circumstances.
Publisher: n/a
|
9781250179760
|
Hardcover
The Last Green Valley
By Sullivan, Mark
In late March 1944, as Stalin's forces push into Ukraine, young Emil and Adeline Martel must make a terrible decision: Do they wait for the Soviet bear's intrusion and risk being sent to Siberia? Or do they reluctantly follow the wolves - murderous Nazi officers who have pledged to protect "pure-blood" Germans?The Martels are one of many families of German heritage whose ancestors have farmed in Ukraine for more than a century. But after already living under Stalin's horrifying regime, Emil and Adeline decide they must run in retreat from their land with the wolves they despise to escape the Soviets and go in search of freedom.Caught between two warring forces and overcoming horrific trials to pursue their hope of immigrating to the West, the Martels' story is a brutal, complex, and ultimately triumphant tale that illuminates the extraordinary power of love, faith, and one family's incredible will to survive and see their dreams realized.
Publisher: n/a
|
9781503958760
|
Hardcover
Band of Sisters
By Willig, Lauren
A group of young women from Smith College risk their lives in France at the height of World War I in this sweeping novel based on a true story - a skillful blend of Call the Midwife and The Alice Network - from New York Times bestselling author Lauren Willig.A scholarship girl from Brooklyn, Kate Moran thought she found a place among Smith's Mayflower descendants, only to have her illusions dashed the summer after graduation. When charismatic alumna Betsy Rutherford delivers a rousing speech at the Smith College Club in April of 1917, looking for volunteers to help French civilians decimated by the German war machine, Kate is too busy earning her living to even think of taking up the call. But when her former best friend Emmeline Van Alden reaches out and begs her to take the place of a girl who had to drop out, Kate reluctantly agrees to join the new Smith College Relief Unit.
The Personal Librarian
By Benedict, Marie
In her twenties, Belle da Costa Greene is hired by J. P. Morgan to curate a collection of rare manuscripts, books, and artwork for his newly built Pierpont Morgan Library. Belle becomes a fixture on the New York society scene and one of the most powerful people in the art and book world, known for her impeccable taste and shrewd negotiating for critical works as she helps build a world-class collection.
But Belle has a secret, one she must protect at all costs. She was born not Belle da Costa Greene but Belle Marion Greener. She is the daughter of Richard Greener, the first Black graduate of Harvard and a well-known advocate for equality. Belle's complexion isn't dark because of her alleged Portuguese heritage that lets her pass as white--her complexion is dark because she is African American.
The Personal Librarian tells the story of an extraordinary woman, famous for her intellect, style, and wit, and shares the lengths to which she must go--for the protection of her family and her legacy--to preserve her carefully crafted white identity in the racist world in which she lives.
The Paris Library
By Charles, Janet Skeslien
Based on the true World War II story of the heroic librarians at the American Library in Paris, this is an unforgettable story of romance, friendship, family, and the power of literature to bring us together, perfect for fans of The Lilac Girls and The Paris Wife. Paris, 1939: Young and ambitious Odile Souchet has it all: her handsome police officer beau and a dream job at the American Library in Paris. When the Nazis march into Paris, Odile stands to lose everything she holds dear, including her beloved library. Together with her fellow librarians, Odile joins the Resistance with the best weapons she has: books. But when the war finally ends, instead of freedom, Odile tastes the bitter sting of unspeakable betrayal. Montana, 1983: Lily is a lonely teenager looking for adventure in small-town Montana.
All Our Shimmering Skies
By Dalton, Trent
From the internationally bestselling and beloved author of the critically acclaimed Boy Swallows Universe, a mesmerizing, uplifting novel of adventure and unlikely friendships in World War II Australia - calling to mind The Wizard of Oz as directed by Baz Luhrmann.Darwin, 1942. As Japanese bombs rain down on her hometown, newly orphaned Molly Hook looks to the skies and runs for her life. Inside a duffel bag, she carries a stone heart and a map that will lead her to Longcoat Bob, the deep-country sorcerer whom she believes cursed her family. Accompanying her are the most unlikely traveling companions: Greta, a razor-tongued actress, and Yukio, a Japanese fighter pilot who's abandoned his post. With messages from the skies above to guide them towards treasure, but foes close on their trail, the trio will encounter the beauty and vastness of the Northern Territory and survive in ways they never thought possible.
Paris Never Leaves You
By Feldman, Ellen
"Masterful. Magnificent. A passionate story of survival and a real page turner. This story will stay with me for a long time." -- Heather Morris, author of The Tattooist of Auschwitz and Cilka's JourneyLiving through World War II working in a Paris bookstore with her young daughter, Vivi, and fighting for her life, Charlotte is no victim, she is a survivor. But can she survive the next chapter of her life?Alternating between wartime Paris and 1950s New York publishing, Ellen Feldman's Paris Never Leaves You is an extraordinary story of resilience, love, and impossible choices, exploring how survival never comes without a cost.The war is over, but the past is never past.
The Book of Lost Names
By Harmel, Kristin
Inspired by an astonishing true story from World War II, a young woman with a talent for forgery helps hundreds of Jewish children flee the Nazis in this unforgettable historical novel from the international bestselling author of the "epic and heart-wrenching World War II tale" (Alyson Noel, #1 New York Times bestselling author) The Winemaker's Wife.Eva Traube Abrams, a semi-retired librarian in Florida, is shelving books one morning when her eyes lock on a photograph in a magazine lying open nearby. She freezes; it's an image of a book she hasn't seen in sixty-five years - a book she recognizes as The Book of Lost Names. The accompanying article discusses the looting of libraries by the Nazis across Europe during World War II - an experience Eva remembers well - and the search to reunite people with the texts taken from them so long ago.
The Forest of Vanishing Stars
By Harmel, Kristin
After being stolen from her wealthy German parents and raised in the unforgiving wilderness of eastern Europe, a young woman finds herself alone in 1941 after her kidnapper dies. Her solitary existence is interrupted, however, when she happens upon a group of Jews fleeing the Nazi terror. Stunned to learn what's happening in the outside world, she vows to teach the group all she can about surviving in the forest - and in turn, they teach her some surprising lessons about opening her heart after years of isolation.
The Diplomat's Wife
By Jenoff, Pam
How have I been lucky enough to come here, to be alive, when so many others are not? I should have died.… But I am here.1945. Surviving the brutality of a Nazi prison camp, Marta Nederman is lucky to have escaped with her life. Recovering from the horror, she meets Paul, an American soldier who gives her hope of a happier future. But their plans to meet in London are dashed when Paul's plane crashes.Devastated and pregnant, Marta marries Simon, a caring British diplomat, and glimpses the joy that home and family can bring. But her happiness is threatened when she learns of a Communist spy in British intelligence, and that the one person who can expose the traitor is connected to her past.
The Woman with the Blue Star
By Jenoff, Pam
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Lost Girls of Paris comes a riveting tale of unfathomable sacrifice and unlikely friendship during World War II.1942. Sadie Gault is eighteen and living with her parents amid the horrors of the Krak -- w Ghetto during World War II. When the Nazis liquidate the ghetto, Sadie and her pregnant mother are forced to seek refuge in the perilous sewers beneath the city. One day Sadie looks up through a grate and sees a girl about her own age buying flowers.Ella Stepanek is an affluent Polish girl living a life of relative ease with her stepmother, who has developed close alliances with the occupying Germans. Scorned by her friends and longing for her fianc, who has gone off to war, Ella wanders Krak -- w restlessly.
The Metal Heart
By Lea, Caroline
"The story of true innocents caught up in the machinery of war. Exquisitely researched, beautifully told, this tiny corner of Scotland came alive for me in all of my senses and I found myself rooting for the central characters with all my heart." - Mary Beth Keane, author of Ask Again, YesIn the dark days of World War II, an unlikely romance blossoms between a Scottish woman and an Italian prisoner of war in this haunting novel with the emotional complexity of The Boat Runner and All the Light We Cannot See - a powerful and atmospheric story of love, jealousy, and conscience that illuminates the beauty of the human spirit from the author of The Glass Woman.In the wake of the Allies' victory in North Africa, 500 Italian soldiers have been sent to a remote island off the Scottish coast to wait out the war.
The Last Bookshop in London
By Martin, Madeline
Inspired by the true World War II history of the few bookshops to survive the Blitz, The Last Bookshop in London is a timeless story of wartime loss, love and the enduring power of literature.August 1939: London prepares for war as Hitler's forces sweep across Europe. Grace Bennett has always dreamed of moving to the city, but the bunkers and blackout curtains that she finds on her arrival were not what she expected. And she certainly never imagined she'd wind up working at Primrose Hill, a dusty old bookshop nestled in the heart of London.Through blackouts and air raids as the Blitz intensifies, Grace discovers the power of storytelling to unite her community in ways she never dreamed - a force that triumphs over even the darkest nights of the war.
The Rose Code
By Quinn, Kate
The New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of The Huntress and The Alice Network returns with another heart-stopping World War II story of three female code breakers at Bletchley Park and the spy they must root out after the war is over.1940. As England prepares to fight the Nazis, three very different women answer the call to mysterious country estate Bletchley Park, where the best minds in Britain train to break German military codes. Vivacious debutante Osla is the girl who has everything - beauty, wealth, and the dashing Prince Philip of Greece sending her roses - but she burns to prove herself as more than a society girl, and puts her fluent German to use as a translator of decoded enemy secrets. Imperious self-made Mab, product of east-end London poverty, works the legendary codebreaking machines as she conceals old wounds and looks for a socially advantageous husband.
The Warsaw Orphan
By Rimmer, Kelly
"Kelly Rimmer's heart-stopping rendering of the war in Nazi-occupied Poland - of life, resistance, survival, and love - will captivate readers page by page ... A carefully researched portrayal of history's darkest hours and one orphan's search for her place in the world." - Lisa Wingate, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Before We Were Yours"A surefire hit [and] a heartbreaking and hopeful story of family, duty, love, salvation, and resistance. The Warsaw Orphan will bring tears to your eyes with its authentically woven complications, moral dilemmas, and unavoidable truths. A thoughtful, beautiful novel." -- Kristin Harmel, New York Times bestselling author of The Book of Lost NamesInspired by the real-life heroine who saved thousands of Jewish children during WWII, The Warsaw Orphan is Kelly Rimmer's most anticipated novel since her bestselling sensation, The Things We Cannot Say.
Our Darkest Night
By Robson, Jennifer
To survive the Holocaust, a young Jewish woman must pose as a Christian farmer's wife in this unforgettable novel from USA Today bestselling author Jennifer Robson - a story of terror, hope, love, and sacrifice, inspired by true events, that vividly evokes the most perilous days of World War II.It is the autumn of 1943, and life is becoming increasingly perilous for Italian Jews like the Mazin family. With Nazi Germany now occupying most of her beloved homeland, and the threat of imprisonment and deportation growing ever more certain, Antonina Mazin has but one hope to survive - to leave Venice and her beloved parents and hide in the countryside with a man she has only just met.Nico Gerardi was studying for the priesthood until circumstances forced him to leave the seminary to run his family's farm.
The Yellow Bird Sings
By Rosner, Jennifer
The girl is forbidden from making a sound, so the yellow bird sings. He sings whatever the girl composes in her head: high-pitched trills of piccolo; low-throated growls of contrabassoon. The bird chirps all the musical parts save percussion, because the barn rabbits obligingly thump their back feet like bass drums, like snares.Music helps the flowers bloom. When the daisies grow abundant, the bird weaves a garland for the girl to wear on her head like a princess -- though no one can see. She must hide from everyone in the village: soldiers, the farmhouse boys, the neighbors too. The lady with squinty eyes and blocky shoes just dragged a boy down the street and returned, proud and straight-backed, cradling a sack of sugar like a baby. -- The Yellow Bird SingsWhat would happen if your five-year-old child was a musical prodigy who could hear symphonies in her head What if you had to keep her silent and hidden for months during wartime in German-occupied Poland After all of the Jews in their town are rounded up and killed during WWII, Rza and her daughter, Shira, find themselves hiding in a farmer's barn. Shira has difficulty staying still and quiet, as music pulses inside her. To pass the time, Rza tells Shira a story: There is a little girl who, with the help of her yellow bird, tends an enchanted garden. The garden must be kept silent -- only the bird can sing the girl's musical compositions -- and together the girl and her bird avert many threats. Thus Rza manages to soothe Shira and shield her from the horrors around them. But then the day comes when their haven is no longer safe and Rza must face an impossible choice: whether to keep Shira by her side, or give her the chance to survive apart.The Yellow Bird Sings is a powerful, beautiful, heartrending novel about the unbreakable bond between a mother and a daughter, and the triumph of hope and beauty even in the darkest of circumstances.
The Last Green Valley
By Sullivan, Mark
In late March 1944, as Stalin's forces push into Ukraine, young Emil and Adeline Martel must make a terrible decision: Do they wait for the Soviet bear's intrusion and risk being sent to Siberia? Or do they reluctantly follow the wolves - murderous Nazi officers who have pledged to protect "pure-blood" Germans?The Martels are one of many families of German heritage whose ancestors have farmed in Ukraine for more than a century. But after already living under Stalin's horrifying regime, Emil and Adeline decide they must run in retreat from their land with the wolves they despise to escape the Soviets and go in search of freedom.Caught between two warring forces and overcoming horrific trials to pursue their hope of immigrating to the West, the Martels' story is a brutal, complex, and ultimately triumphant tale that illuminates the extraordinary power of love, faith, and one family's incredible will to survive and see their dreams realized.
Band of Sisters
By Willig, Lauren
A group of young women from Smith College risk their lives in France at the height of World War I in this sweeping novel based on a true story - a skillful blend of Call the Midwife and The Alice Network - from New York Times bestselling author Lauren Willig.A scholarship girl from Brooklyn, Kate Moran thought she found a place among Smith's Mayflower descendants, only to have her illusions dashed the summer after graduation. When charismatic alumna Betsy Rutherford delivers a rousing speech at the Smith College Club in April of 1917, looking for volunteers to help French civilians decimated by the German war machine, Kate is too busy earning her living to even think of taking up the call. But when her former best friend Emmeline Van Alden reaches out and begs her to take the place of a girl who had to drop out, Kate reluctantly agrees to join the new Smith College Relief Unit.