<p>The Crossing is a powerful and haunting love story of surprising discovery set in Manhattan’s Hell’s Kitchen during Prohibition. Its mission seeks to reconcile love and guilt, grief and promise. Set apart from other stories, it combines history, fact, surrealism, and reality into an ever-recycling boost of the human spirit.\nIrish-born Johnny Flynn, a former British soldier, is banished from his homeland and sent to America on a ship so riddled with disease that he realizes the voyage was meant to murder him. When he survives the trip, the captain forces him to walk the plank into the Hudson River. Miraculously, Johnny is rescued by a rumrunning Irish gang, the Swamp Angels, and given a job running whisky in Hell’s Kitchen just as Prohibition makes liquor a hugely profitable, dangerous business.\nFighting for his life and livelihood amid the denizens of the Manhattan piers, Johnny is plagued by the memory of his lost lover, Nora, whose father, the famed Irish revolutionary, James Connolly, met his death through a firing squad that included a reluctant gunman named Johnny Flynn. Nora’s last words to him, when she learned of his betrayal and left him, “I love you, Johnny Flynn”, echo in his heart, leaving him pulsing with guilt, yearning, and the hope that she might yet forgive him.\nJohnny drinks hard. One night, drunk on the floor of Hailey’s speakeasy, he encounters a seeming apparition on stage, the ghostly Esme, an Irish singer who suffered unspeakable horrors at the hands of the British Black and Tans. Johnny is dazzled by her. She is not only a singer but a healer, teaching poor and afflicted children to sing and gather hope at an old theater called The Woebegone. From Esme Johnny learns how to overcome the desire for revenge, only to discover that she, too, clings to her own dark dream of retribution.\nHell’s Kitchen, Johnny discovers, is thronged with people whose damaged hearts ache for revenge, repentance and love. As he grapples with taking responsibility to help others resolve this overwhelming dilemma, he learns that Nora is coming to New York to advocate for Irish independence. As he confronts her and soon thereafter receives a piercing love letter from Esme, the story comes to a turbulent climax.</p>

The Crossing

Literature & Fiction

Jones, Ashby

United States

Addison & Highsmith Publishers

Histria Romance

<p>The Angel’s Lamp, set in war-torn Ireland just after the Easter Rising, centers around a love affair between Johnny Flynn, an Irish-bred, English staff-sergeant in charge of the rebellion's soon-to-be executed leaders, and Nora Connolly, the firebrand daughter of James Connolly, the uprising’s charismatic leader. Johnny meets Nora while standing guard over her soon-to-be executed father and is struck by her determination to take the fight to the British. But then, unknown to Nora and under the threat of death Johnny is unexpectedly summoned to serve on the firing squad that executes Connolly. Ridden with guilt after the execution and feeling a traitor to his heritage given all he has seen and done, Johnny deserts the British Army, joins the ragtag Irish rebels, and soon crosses paths with Nora. The story that follows culminates in an fiery emotional conflict between Johnny and Nora that pits the possibilities of love against the unyielding obstacles to forgiveness.</p>

The Angel's Lamp

Top Hat Books

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