Rose of Anzio

"Tessa, I don’t know how to swing dance, and I wouldn’t be very good at it if I tried. But if you care, I’d like to do a different kind of dance with you.”

Summer 1940. Fourteen-year-old Tessa Graham finds herself in a new, unfamiliar world. For her safety, she is sent from England to Chicago to live with the prominent Ardley family just before the London Blitz. Stifled by the ways of the rich, she is soon drawn to the city’s infamous South Side. A world filled with jitterbug dancing and intrigues of the powerful Irish community. But is this the escape she really wants?

On the University of Chicago campus, 18-year-old Anthony Ardley has to make a choice. His country stands at the brink of war. Conscription threatens to become reality. As sole heir to the Ardley fortune, should he stand with his beloved uncle, a staunch isolationist, or join his radical classmates clamoring for American intervention?

What will happen when Tessa and Anthony cross paths on the way to discovering themselves?

A coming of age tale that emerges into an epic love story, this book takes you back to Chicago in the pre-war era, when two young people must find their paths in a world that is fast falling out of control.