Fragments of Light

Ceelie and her friend Darlene are tough women, their mettle forged in their shared battle against cancer. Many decades earlier, Sabine and Lise form an equally tough pair, surviving without parents in occupied France. Both sets of characters, however, soon face seemingly insurmountable obstacles. The young orphans find themselves in the middle of the Allied invasion on D-day, and the cancer survivors both receive devastating news. To distract themselves, Ceelie and Darlene embark on an adventure to find out the truth behind a handful of World War II–era letters written by Darlene’s father—a man described as both a war hero and a deadbeat dad. Phoenix (The Space Between Words) weaves the quest for truth through time and space in surprising ways. From the beaches of D-day to postwar rural America to the sterile cancer ward, the characters are real without being crass and beaten down without losing hope.