The Time Left between Us
A blend of memoir, history, and oral storytelling, The Time Left between Us bridges the gap between the generation who fought World War II and the generation who has forgotten it. Alicia DeFonzo takes an unplanned visit to the Normandy beaches while staying in Paris. Her grandfather “Del” (Anthony DelRossi) had fought in World War II, and she becomes distraught after realizing how little she knows about the war and his experiences, which until then had remained largely unspoken.

Across landscapes and lifetimes DeFonzo retraces her beloved grandfather’s tour through World War II Europe. The eighty-four-year-old DelRossi recounts stories as an army combat engineer surviving major campaigns, including Normandy, St. Lo, the Bulge, Hürtgenwald, and Remagen, then liberating concentration camps. In this braided narrative, we see DeFonzo’s childhood in a traditional Italian American family with an erratic Marine Corps father and a beloved grandfather. Spanning ten years, DeFonzo’s travels and research take an unexpected detour after she inherits a Nazi Waffen-SS diary from her grandfather, and, in her final trip, returns to Germany to confront the diary owner’s family. DeFonzo’s and her grandfather’s stories merge when Del undergoes open-heart surgery and Alicia must be the one to safeguard the past.

Both nostalgic and gripping, The Time Left between Us is a meditation on how deeply connected the past is to the present and how the truth—and what we remember of it—are fragmented.
 
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The Time Left between Us
A blend of memoir, history, and oral storytelling, The Time Left between Us bridges the gap between the generation who fought World War II and the generation who has forgotten it. Alicia DeFonzo takes an unplanned visit to the Normandy beaches while staying in Paris. Her grandfather “Del” (Anthony DelRossi) had fought in World War II, and she becomes distraught after realizing how little she knows about the war and his experiences, which until then had remained largely unspoken.

Across landscapes and lifetimes DeFonzo retraces her beloved grandfather’s tour through World War II Europe. The eighty-four-year-old DelRossi recounts stories as an army combat engineer surviving major campaigns, including Normandy, St. Lo, the Bulge, Hürtgenwald, and Remagen, then liberating concentration camps. In this braided narrative, we see DeFonzo’s childhood in a traditional Italian American family with an erratic Marine Corps father and a beloved grandfather. Spanning ten years, DeFonzo’s travels and research take an unexpected detour after she inherits a Nazi Waffen-SS diary from her grandfather, and, in her final trip, returns to Germany to confront the diary owner’s family. DeFonzo’s and her grandfather’s stories merge when Del undergoes open-heart surgery and Alicia must be the one to safeguard the past.

Both nostalgic and gripping, The Time Left between Us is a meditation on how deeply connected the past is to the present and how the truth—and what we remember of it—are fragmented.
 
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The Time Left between Us

The Time Left between Us

by Alicia DeFonzo
The Time Left between Us

The Time Left between Us

by Alicia DeFonzo

Hardcover

$29.95 
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Overview

A blend of memoir, history, and oral storytelling, The Time Left between Us bridges the gap between the generation who fought World War II and the generation who has forgotten it. Alicia DeFonzo takes an unplanned visit to the Normandy beaches while staying in Paris. Her grandfather “Del” (Anthony DelRossi) had fought in World War II, and she becomes distraught after realizing how little she knows about the war and his experiences, which until then had remained largely unspoken.

Across landscapes and lifetimes DeFonzo retraces her beloved grandfather’s tour through World War II Europe. The eighty-four-year-old DelRossi recounts stories as an army combat engineer surviving major campaigns, including Normandy, St. Lo, the Bulge, Hürtgenwald, and Remagen, then liberating concentration camps. In this braided narrative, we see DeFonzo’s childhood in a traditional Italian American family with an erratic Marine Corps father and a beloved grandfather. Spanning ten years, DeFonzo’s travels and research take an unexpected detour after she inherits a Nazi Waffen-SS diary from her grandfather, and, in her final trip, returns to Germany to confront the diary owner’s family. DeFonzo’s and her grandfather’s stories merge when Del undergoes open-heart surgery and Alicia must be the one to safeguard the past.

Both nostalgic and gripping, The Time Left between Us is a meditation on how deeply connected the past is to the present and how the truth—and what we remember of it—are fragmented.
 

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781640125131
Publisher: Potomac Books
Publication date: 09/01/2022
Pages: 232
Product dimensions: 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Alicia DeFonzo is an award-winner professor and author of the WWII nonfiction narrative The Time Left Between Us (Potomac Books, 2022). Featured on CNBC and NPR, DeFonzo has been the literary guest for the 80th anniversary of D-Day ceremonies in Normandy as well as the Battle of the Bulge celebration by the Ambassador of Luxembourg. Library Journal calls her debut book "a deeply personal venture but also one of significant importance now and for all future generations to learn from."

A Senior Lecturer of Writing and Literature at Old Dominion University and former Fulbright Specialist, she is a frequent literary guest and contributing writer to NPR programs and regional expert on banned books and literary censorship.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Preface
1: A Visit
2: Operation Overlord
3: France in June
4: The Neighborhood, 1924
5: The Bocage
6: Dad
7: The Turk
8: Grandpop
9: Hürtgenwald
10: The Soldier Friend
11: The Bulge
12: The Diary
13: Lost Men
14: O Holy Night
15: Christmas Eve
16: Werner and Gertrud
17: Remagen
18: The Camps
19: The Letters
20: The Saar
21: Rose
22: Luxembourg
23: Waves Ahead
24: St. Patrick’s Day
25: Lieselotte
26: The Coast
27: The Last Stop
28: Boys of War
29: No Visitors
30.
31: Borrowed Time
32.
33.
34.
35: Tell Me Again
36.
37: The Memorial
38. Not a Moment More or Less
39: Eulogy
40: The Truth
41: Salute
Acknowledgments
Appendix: Bronze Service Star Timeline
Notes
Bibliography
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