Janet Brantley

Leaving Dixon's Crossing Janet Brantley

1941 - A liberated ROSIE the Riveter!




The last few years have been hard on everyone in Dixon's Crossing, Arkansas. But for Mae Johnson, things are looking up.

* She's managed to graduate high school, despite the rigors of the Depression.

* She has a plan to escape the debilitating sharecropping life that would surely turn her into a copy of her hard-working, old-before-her-time mama.

* The exciting city of Texarkana is calling to her like a siren song - and the pull is strong!

So - what could go wrong? SHE'S ABOUT TO FIND OUT!




When Pearl Harbor sucks America into another World War, she finds her world turned upside down, with two ammo plants taking over Texarkana. "Fun and games" turns into serious war work. Can Mae really build bullets, grenades, and bombs without killing herself or someone else?

Plunked down in the middle of a society in upheaval, with men going off to war and women going off to work, how will she handle the changes? And with racial tensions on the rise, how will Mae face her own prejudices?




And what of her vow not to marry young? The stakes are higher now.

Should she wed her good-guy best friend Oliver before he ships out? Stability, of a sort.

Or perhaps bad-boy Frank, the ex-boyfriend she still loves, but who will bring nothing but uncertainty?

Or neither? Maybe forget about love altogether!




Whatever - There's war work to be done!