The Promise She Made
A Historical Fiction Novel
In September 1940, as England braces for a possible Nazi invasion, Ruby takes her little sister Eliza to Canada aboard the SS City of Benares. She promised her dying mother that she would keep her sister safe, and she means to do so. But the Benares is torpedoed by the Germans in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, leading to a catastrophic loss of life.
Ruby watches eight-year-old Eliza sink beneath the waves and disappear.
Tortured by grief and a crippling sense of remorse, Ruby struggles to move past the horrors of that night. She trains as a spy with the SOE, determined to fight back against the Nazis who attacked a ship full of children. She even reconnects with her childhood sweetheart. But her every effort to rebuild her life is thwarted by an irrational voice inside her head that insists Eliza is out there somewhere, waiting to be found.
Then, on the night of the York Blitz, Ruby returns to her family home. Bombs are raining down on the city, and among the ruins of her lost life, she uncovers a mysterious note.
Eliza is alive. I’ve seen her. You must find her…
To be Published by Bookouture, February 2025
Now available on Amazon for pre-order for Kindle
