In the days just after the end of World War Two, a young Texas Navy pilot named Jack Sweeney falls crazy in love with a California girl just before he is shipped off to the Pacific with his squadron. He woos her with letters and makes away with her heart. He returns safely; he marries her.
Over thirty years later, a young woman returns to her childhood home in California for her mother’s funeral. Before leaving the house for the last time, without knowing what she’s looking for, she opens a dresser drawer in her mother’s room. Towards the very back of the drawer she discovers a packet of old letters tied up with a pink ribbon. In these letters she meets the man she has forever longed to know and love, the man her mother rarely spoke of during all the years of her childhood. In these letters she meets her father, Jack Sweeney, for the first time.
As Always, Jack is in part the bittersweet story of a daughter’s search for her father, an account of her struggle to unlock the mystery of his disappearance on the eve of her birth. Preserved in this story, however, is another, more universal one: the sweet and classic tale of true love in a time of war. ~~ from the publisher
Axios Press
My thoughts on As Always, Jack: A Wartime Love Story ~~
This is a beautiful little book with a gorgeous cover. Emma Sweeney found a bundle of letters that she had never seen before, after her mother passed away. They were the letters that her father, who died before Emma was born, wrote to her mother right after the two of them met.
They had just two weeks together before he was sent to war but he returned and the two of them were married. After 10 years of marriage and just months before Emma is born, Jack and his plane were lost in the Bermuda Triangle. Emma's mother didn't talk about her father much but through these letters, Emma finds out so much about him and their relationship; her parents were very much in love and her father was a very kind and gentle man with a wonderful sense of humor.
The flow of this book is a little awkward at the beginning. It's contains the letters that Jack wrote to the love of his life so it is very one-sided, we don't get to read what she wrote back to him. And his sense of humor made the letters seem a bit confusing too, until I finally just 'got it' and came to enjoy his way of looking at things.
What a wonderful treasure these letters are for Emma. She is able to truly understand what her parents were like when they were young and in love. How many of us have that knowledge of our parent's early lives? I know I don't, but really wish that I did. Through these letters, Emma is finally able to meet her father and is able to learn what kind of a man he was. She regrets that he was not a physical part of her life but she comes to realize who he was and knows that he would have loved her very much.
This is a short but powerful book of love and I highly recommend it if you are a romantic at heart.
Thanks to TLC Book Tours, I have 2 copies of As Always, Jack to offer in a giveaway.
Enter using the Rafflecopter below.
About Emma Sweeney
Emma Sweeney is the author of several gardening books as well as a literary agent based in New York. She formed her own agency in 2006 and has had five New York Times bestsellers, including the #1 New York Times best seller, Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen. She is a member of the Association of Authors’ Representatives and the Women’s Media Group, where she served as its president in 2003. She graduated from the University of California at Berkeley with a BA in English Literature. She divides her time between New York City and Rhinebeck, New York.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
