Angel of Mercy

The first installment in a spellbinding trilogy centered around Canada's involvement in World War I follows a privileged young newlywed to the fraught medical encampments of the Western Front.

Being an idle housewife never suited Hettie Bartlette. So, when her husband, Geoffrey, decided to enlist only a couple of months after their wedding, the choice to join him was easy.

At the time, it seemed as if the tide would turn against the Germans at any moment. But once the ambitious young couple arrives in Europe, it's plain to see that the turmoil on French soil shows no indication of abating.

It isn't all bad: Hettie finds purpose tending to the wounded in the Casualty Clearing Station. Unlike people back home in Ontario, hardly anyone within the Allied forces believes her work as an army nurse to be unseemly for a married woman of Hettie's wealth and breeding.

But nothing, not even coming face-to-face with the horrific aftermath of gas and gunfire on a daily basis, can prepare Hettie for the tragedies and tribulations 1915 has in store. With letters from her family pouring in, begging her to come home, Hettie must soon decide on which side of the Atlantic she belongs.