What We Leave Behind: A Novel

In 1947, war bride Ursula arrives in Minneapolis torn between guilt over leaving loved ones behind and her desire to start a new life—and a family—in this promised land. But the American dream proves elusive—she is struck with polio, and then shocked by the sudden death of her GI husband.

Without a spouse or the child she so desperately wanted, Ursula must rely on her shrewd survival skills from wartime Berlin, and she takes in a boarder to help make ends meet. She soon falls in love with t...