It’s 1940 and Gaby’s parents and sister succumb to Typhus after staying in France to care for Gaby and Sabine’s dying grandmother. The war is in full swing and Gaby can’t get home to Poughkeepsie, NY. Her aunt lives in Ireland, which stayed neutral during WWII, so she heads there. But the aunt has just died, and 18-year-old Gaby makes her way to the remote manor of her aunt’s husband’s relatives, where she’s hired as a servant. In a different reality, 17-year-old Sabine is the sister who survived. She also finds her way to Ireland, but Germany has invaded, so she’s in hiding. Then Sabine gets to the same remote manor where for one hour at dusk, a mystical time according to Irish legend, she and Gaby meet and talk. We Meet Apart (Regal House Publishing, 2026) is about family, resilience, and survival in the face of war, death, and the world of ghosts. Martha Conway grew up in northern Ohio and earned her B.A. in English and History from Vassar College. She received a master’s in English: Creative Writing, from San Francisco State University. Her previous novels include The Underground River, which was a New York Times Book Editor’s Choice, and Thieving Forest, which won the North American Book Award for Historical Fiction. Her short fiction has been published in The Iowa Review, Carolina Quarterly, Missouri Review, Folio, and other journals. She is a recipient of a California Arts Council fellowship, and she teaches creative writing for Stanford University’s Writing Certificate program. When Martha is not writing or reading, she's playing at being a flaneuse—a city stroller—or traveling to Italy to see Roman ruins with her husband, a former archeologist. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

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“What did the council decide on item 42?” — answered with the speaker and the moment.