Janet Skeslien Charles Books in Order

Underemployed engineer Daria moonlights as an interpreter for an international matchmaking agency in 1994 Odessa. Tempted by an American client's promise of stability, she weighs love, migration, and the uncertain costs of leaving her home behind.

In wartime Paris, librarian Odile Souchet and her colleagues resist restrictions on readers through their work with books. Decades later in Montana, her friendship with teenager Lily connects a lonely present with secrets from the past.

In 1918, librarian Jessie Carson joins women rebuilding devastated French communities and creates libraries near the front. Decades later, New York librarian Wendy Peterson investigates her forgotten story, discovering unexpected connections between their lives and the work they share.