"Oh That I Had Wings"

"Oh that I had Wings" is the prequel to "Finding Grace". this book focuses on John Langdon Junior or Jack. Jack feels there is life beyond Stones Mill, Virginia. Jack starts out a 9 yr old boy growing up with a stern father. His Grandma Langdon is his the only ray of light in the family that gives him affection. She makes a prophecy one day a great lady will come into his life. When his sister Grace is born, Mr.Langdon wished her to be a boy and her mother paid her little attention. He knew his father's temper too well and wanted to protect her.

Grace accidentally knocks a baseball in a window. Jack saves her from a beating and Mr.Langdon throws a brick at Jack sending to the hospital a few days. He meets a red haired girl named Alice Miller once and thinks he will never see her again. He runs off to join the military during WWI and progresses into a young man among the horrors of war. This is when he first meets Henry Shaw and his first love, a French nurse named Esme. Esme, a young widow, is puzzled by some of his prudish ways but soon opens him up. Upon returning home, he finds out Alice had taken a teaching job there.. Alice is not like the other women he knows. She is independent, wears make up and pants which doesn't set well with townspeople. A relationship develops between much to the chagrin of his family but this doesn't stop them. It is a good coming of age and romance story all in one.