Publisher's Synopsis
On the rugged shores of Bailey Island, Maine, two love stories-separated by decades-intertwine through the whispers of the past.
Unspoken Promises is about Kenzie and Eleanor, one rebuilding her life in the present day and one left waiting during WWII. It's about the promises both women made to themselves and about the unspoken ones they made to others. It is about love, loyalty and starting over.
Kenzie, determined after a marriage of always giving in, promises herself that she is going to be her own woman, learn to make her own decisions and not fall for the first man she meets. Then she nearly trips over the dangerously charming Sam Phillips who has his head under an old truck he's trying to fix.
While poking through the dusty old attic, Kenzie finds boxes of fun old puzzles, books it will take years to read and a wedding dress that had never been worn. On a whim, she tries it on, admiring the lovely dress in front of a tall oak mirror as old as the house. Then it's 1943 and Eleanor Murray is happily planning her wedding. Her aunt is pinning up the hem of her gown while Eleanor smiles at her reflection. Then her fiancé barges into the room to announce he's just enlisted in the Army to join the war in Europe and their wedding will have to wait. Crushed, Eleanor hides her sense of abandonment, plants a Victory Garden and knits socks for Red Cross care packages for soldiers on the front lines.
As her fiancé's letters become more and more distant and her brother's best friend, home to recover after his plane is shot down, starts wooing her, Eleanor accepts her aunt's invitation to come stay with her in New York. She finds work at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, a job critical to supporting the war, in an effort to keep the unspoken promises she made when it all began.
Love, loss, and courage collide in this sweeping dual-timeline tale where the heart remembers what fear tries to erase.
