The Scottish Highlands, 1943 A family torn apart by the secrets of war. In a remote corner of Scotland something momentous is underway. When Effie's father receives a government notice to quit Kirk Farm, the lives of the Ross family and those of the whole community are utterly disrupted. But for Effie – irrepressible, beautiful, vital – wartime changes bring her close to Toni, an Italian prisoner of war sent to work on the farm. Before long, the young couple are planning a future together when the war is finally over. It’s a future that's under threat from the start. For there are those among them who cannot quite be trusted. Someone is determined to find out what lies behind the upheaval – and to pass those secrets into enemy hands. To stop them will create devastation beyond anything anyone could have imagined. Based on true events of the Second World War, this evocative novel captures the emotions, dangers and atmosphere of the days when the world faced its darkest hour. From the bestselling author of The Italian Chapel and Casting Off (as P.I. Paris), Philip Paris reveals the depths to which human beings are driven to by passion, loyalty and resentment. "Effie's War is an intriguing, twisting and turning journey and an outstanding page-turner that you won’t be able to put down." – MILLIE GRAY, author of Silver Linings

1943: In a remote corner of the Scottish Highlands, something momentous is underway. When Effie's father receives a government notice to quit Kirk Farm, the lives of the Ross family and those of the whole community are utterly disrupted. But for Effie - irrepressible, beautiful, vital - wartime changes bring her close to Toni, an Italian prisoner of war sent to work on the farm. Before long, the young couple are planning a future together when the war is finally over - but it's a future that's under threat from the start. For there are those among them who cannot quite be trusted. Someone is determined to find out what lies behind the upheaval - and to pass those secrets into enemy hands. Stopping them will create devastation beyond anything anyone could have imagined...

A Brahmin, member of an illustrious family, sister of the martyred Robert Gould Shaw, who led his proud black troops against Fort Wagner, and, later, a war widow, Lowell constantly responded to changing ideological and economic conditions affecting the poor.

Effie Jones, a former slave who escaped to the Union side as a child, was taken in by an army surgeon and his wife. She learned to read and write, to tolerate the sight of blood and broken bodies -- and to forget what is too painful to bear. Now a young freedwoman, she has returned south to New Orleans and quietly earns her living as an embalmer. But despite her reticence, two chance encounters introduce her to new worlds of activism, and of social ambition. Effie decides to seek out the past she has blocked from her memory and try to trace her kin. As her hopes are tested by betrayal, Effie faces loss and heartache, but also a chance to finally find her place.

Inspired by real women, this powerful novel tells the story of two unconventional American sisters who volunteer at the front during World War I August 1914. While Europe enters a brutal conflict unlike any waged before, the Duncan household in Baltimore, Maryland, is the setting for a different struggle. Ruth and Elise Duncan long to escape the roles that society, and their controlling father, demand they play. Together, the sisters volunteer for the war effort—Ruth as a nurse, Elise as a driver. Stationed at a makeshift hospital in Ypres, Belgium, Ruth soon confronts war’s harshest lesson: not everyone can be saved. Rising above the appalling conditions, she seizes an opportunity to realize her dream to practice medicine as a doctor. Elise, an accomplished mechanic, finds purpose and an unexpected kinship within the all-female Ambulance Corps. Through bombings, heartache and loss, Ruth and Elise cherish an independence rarely granted to women, unaware that their greatest challenges are still to come. Illuminating the critical role women played in the Great War, this is a remarkable story of resilience, sacrifice and the bonds that can never be vanquished.

In September 1939, Effie Reinhardt Kohl is like every other seventeen-year-old German youth. She has her circle of friends, her family, her dates, and her enjoyment of all things important to teenage girls. But as Hitlers war machine begins its path of destruction, Effies carefree existence is interrupted as she is quickly escorted into an adulthood she is not prepared to face. Some seventy-two years later, Effie is living in a nursing home when she decides to disclose a long-held secret to a nursing assistant with the hope of finding understanding. As the harsh truth is revealed, Effie retells the events that pulled her kicking and screaming into the cruel grip of Hitlers new Germany. It ultimately transformed her from an innoncent teen to a traitor who harbored Jews and a murderer. Unfortunately, this is a truth her children have never known. As her story slowly surfaces, Effie is left to wonder whether they will understand her motives and find forgiveness, or despise her for her part in the betrayal so many others shunned. In this historical novel, an elderly woman journeys into the past in order to gain understanding and forgiveness for her traitorous role as a German girl thrust into an unimaginable life.