“All the Little Hopes” is finalist in the 25th Annual Literary Awards. Learn more and cast your vote at the Library of Virginia website

ROANOKE, Va. (WDBJ) – A local author is getting national attention for her second novel.

Read the full story and watch the video at https://www.wdbj7.com/2021/09/15/local-author-discusses-second-novel/

Author Talk in conversation with Jessica Handler and Leah Weiss at Atlanta History Center

Leah Weiss in conversation with John Charles. Weiss discusses All The Little Hopes.

Weiss (If the Creek Don’t Rise) delivers an intriguing coming of age story of two 13-year-old girls whose summer idyll is complicated by mysterious events. Lucy Brown lives on a tobacco farm in Riverton, N.C., in 1943 with her six siblings. She forms a quick friendship with Bert Tucker, who comes to Riverton to stay with her pregnant aunt Violet, whose husband Larry has disappeared, after Bert’s mother dies. Lucy’s mother then brings Bert into the Browns’ home when Violet is admitted to a psychiatric hospital. Lucy’s understanding of WWII is based on her knowledge of her older soldier brother, Everett, and of her father’s deal with the U.S. government to provide beeswax. But after Riverton becomes home to a Nazi prisoner-of-war camp, Lucy learns firsthand of the war’s divisiveness, as rumors and distrust run rampant through the community. Lucy, an avid Nancy Drew reader, then bands with Bert in an effort solve the mystery of Larry’s disappearance, and of a singer who went missing after performing at a town dance. Weiss expertly highlights how Lucy and Bert’s innocence is altered by their experiences, with spot-on depictions of the rural Southern community. This is magnetic from the start. Agent: Rebecca Gradinger, Fletcher and Co. (July)

Source: https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-72823-274-4

Read a summary and multiple book reviews and discussions of of All the Little Hopes by Leah Weiss on BrowseBooks.com

Kate Forbes narrates this tender coming-of-age story set in North Carolina’s tobacco country. When tragedy brings 13-year-old Allie Bert to the home of her unstable aunt, she finds a true friend in Lucy, who aspires to be fearless like her heroine, Nancy Drew. Together, the pair face family worries, mysterious disappearances, and the opening of a Nazi POW camp in their own backyard. Forbes does a beautiful job rendering the soft tones of a North Carolina accent.

Source: https://audiofilemagazine.com/reviews/read/202904/all-the-little-hopes-by-leah-weiss/

if you love excellent historical fiction, excellent Southern fiction, or excellent literature in general, you should get it sooner rather than later. If you’re stone cold broke, get on the list at your local library. This is one of the year’s best, hands down.

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Leah Weiss tells a gripping wartime story of family, honeybees and missing men in her second novel, set in North Carolina.

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When my first book was launched, I had the great honor of sharing my story behind the novel IF THE CREEK DON’T RISE with Dr. Rose Martin on her PBS show, Write Around the Corner.