Hi time travelers,
Today I’m excited to tell you about my new book, The Wounded Nurse.
This book, the second in the ‘WW2 Girls’ series, is the story of Grace, a young woman who learns to love herself again.
Grace, an intern nurse, arrives in Italy to take part in the war and save lives, but eight days later she is wounded and loses her leg. For her, a much greater private war has begun.
During recovery, surrounded by other casualties and nurses, Grace will struggle to return to being a nurse despite her injury, and to find the man who will love her.
This book tells the story of soldiers fighting a never-ending war, trying to overcome their own wounds and keep their humanity: the blinded John, old nurse Audry, an Italian villager named Francesca, and B17-bomber pilot Henri. All of them have gathered with Grace to tell a story of struggle on the Italian front, the least-known of the European conflicts in WW2.
For American soldiers, the war in Europe began in November 1942, long before the invasion of Normandy that took place only two years later in June 1944. But the fighting began far from Europe, in North Africa, against the German forces of Rommel and the Italian army. In July 1943, after North Africa’s liberation, the Americans invaded Sicily and the Italian campaign began. The harsh fighting against the German lines in Italy would last until the end of the war two years later, and Grace’s story begins during one of those battles.
As a writer, I faced the dilemma of where to start Grace’s story, and I can tell you, my readers, that I wrote eight opening drafts of that story. The first was in the North African desert, then in Cairo, inside the headquarters of the British Army Mediterranean, standing in front of an arrogant British officer. Later on, I wrote an opening scene in an army supply truck headed from Naples north to the front lines and the war, but finally I decided that the book should start in a field hospital tent minutes before Grace is injured.
The book is in the final stages of print and digital preparation these days, and will be published soon.
I invite you to enter the book page.
Thanks
