The glitzy days of 1920s New York meet the devastation of those left behind in World War II in a new, bold historical novel shifting between the glamour of the Jazz Age and the heavy atmosphere of the 1940s.
In the final months of World War II, San Francisco newspaper secretary Ellie Morgan should be planning her wedding. Even though she harbors secret dreams of having her own column, Ellie’s groom expects her to depart the newsroom for domestic life. When she gets the telegram she’s been dreading—her pilot father is missing—she refuses to believe the worst. But when she discovers a stack of love letters from a woman who isn’t her mother in his possessions, her already fragile world goes into a tailspin, and she vows to find out the truth about the father she loves—and this stranger who loved him, too.
When Ellie arrives on her aunt Iris’s doorstep, clutching the letters and uttering a name Iris hasn’t heard in decades, Iris is frozen. Her experiences in New York City in the 1920s could reveal the origin of Ellie’s father’s alleged affair, but she’s hidden her past as a Ziegfeld Follies showgirl from her family for twenty years.
Iris had dreamed of the spotlight, but found herself trapped in the dark underbelly of Jazz Age New York. She’s spent two decades fearing that her actions in those days led to murder. But now, finally, it’s time to uncover the truth.Together the two women embark on a cross-country mission to the City That Never Sleeps, a journey that just might shatter everything they thought they knew—about their family, their past, and their future.
Inspired by a true Jazz Age cold case that captivated the nation, and the fact that more than 72,000 Americans still remain unaccounted for from World War II, The Pilot’s Daughter is a page-turning exploration of the stories we tell ourselves and of how well we can ever know the people we love.