Thank you Bookishfirst for an ARC copy this novel. by Ellen Marie Wiseman. I adored her novel “What She Left Behind, so I could not wait to read her new one.
It’s 1918, and the Spanish flu epidemic has hit Philadelphia hard. Pia Lange, the 13-year-old daughter of German immigrants, must fight for her survival and that of her twin brothers who are less than a year old. When Pia gets sick herself, circumstances get out of her control and her brothers go missing. But Pia will not give her fight to find her brothers, no matter how long it takes, she will find out what happened to the twins.
I love books that take place in locations that I’m familiar with. As the Lange’s currently lived in Philadelphia, where I currently reside, I was hooked. Then when I learned that the family previously lived in Hazleton,PA, a town I grew up within a half hour of, and that Pia’s father worked there as a coal miner, just like my great-grandfather in that area in that time period (he was also an immigrant - from the Ukraine) I felt intimately affected by this book, almost as if this story could have been about one of of my relatives!
Further, with the current state of the Covid pandemic, a book about the last big epidemic in the United States was more than poignant and relevant.
This was a book I couldn’t put down. I was completely captivated by Pia and her search to find her family. Also, the antagonist in the story, a xenophobic woman masquerading as a nurse who wants to rid Philadelphia of immigrant children, among other things, was a brilliant invention to add that element of suspense to the novel.
It’s 1918, and the Spanish flu epidemic has hit Philadelphia hard. Pia Lange, the 13-year-old daughter of German immigrants, must fight for her survival and that of her twin brothers who are less than a year old. When Pia gets sick herself, circumstances get out of her control and her brothers go missing. But Pia will not give her fight to find her brothers, no matter how long it takes, she will find out what happened to the twins.
I love books that take place in locations that I’m familiar with. As the Lange’s currently lived in Philadelphia, where I currently reside, I was hooked. Then when I learned that the family previously lived in Hazleton,PA, a town I grew up within a half hour of, and that Pia’s father worked there as a coal miner, just like my great-grandfather in that area in that time period (he was also an immigrant - from the Ukraine) I felt intimately affected by this book, almost as if this story could have been about one of of my relatives!
Further, with the current state of the Covid pandemic, a book about the last big epidemic in the United States was more than poignant and relevant.
This was a book I couldn’t put down. I was completely captivated by Pia and her search to find her family. Also, the antagonist in the story, a xenophobic woman masquerading as a nurse who wants to rid Philadelphia of immigrant children, among other things, was a brilliant invention to add that element of suspense to the novel.