All of Jory's life, she saw visions of the past in her great-grandmother's fulllength mirror. But whenever she saw the ghost of her great-uncle Irv Lerman, dressed in his Air Corps uniform, always standing tall by his mother, she knew that she was meant to save him--by traveling back in time and preventing his untimely death in World War II.
Researching everything she would need to go back in time, she planned her adventure down to the last detail. London during wartime was not what Jory had expected--it was worse. But her relationship with Irv became even more than she could have ever expected. He became a big brother, a protector, and her soul mate. Their strong bond was unbreakable, even through time.
Jory's harrowing adventure involved living through air raids of the city and the dangerous kindertransport of Jewish children escaping the Holocaust. But saving Irv from his fate would take convincing on his part. Dying for his country was part of the deal when he signed up to go to war. Now that his "angel," his "soul mate," had come back through time to save him, would he make the choice to live? Or would Jory's journey through time be forever in vain?
Melissa Young-Wilkinson grew up in Beachwood, Ohio, which is a predominantly Jewish community. Growing up, she attended Hebrew school and Sunday school and had a bat mitzvah. Melissa was also born with a disability in which she wears two prosthetic legs, but that has never stopped her from living life. She attended Beachwood Day Camps and loves to swim. She attended Beachwood High School and graduated from Stephen College in Columbia, Missouri, with a Bachelor of Arts in child psychology in 1989. Melissa lives in Mayfield Heights, Ohio, with her husband and two children and her Yorkie-Poo, Daisy. Melissa enjoys reading and learning about people's family histories. She enjoys watching any series about royal history and World War II. She has read many biographies of Holocaust survivors, and they always affect her. She has always found the human spirit remarkable, especially what the human spirit can do to survive such horrible conditions.
Melissa was always fascinated with her family history. She loved hearing stories about the past and the struggles her family had to endure in order to live free in America. She has a strong tie to her family and has always had their stories in her head. She was always told by her children and her friends that she was an excellent storyteller and that she should write a book, and so she finally did. Being a firsttime writer was definitely a challenge. Finding time to conduct research for the book and writing the story of Jory and Irv was most challenging because they never met--not even in real life.
