Sarah McCoy

Sarah McCoy, the author of the novel The Time It Snowed in Puerto Rico, will read from and sign her new novel The Baker’s Daughter ($23.00 Crown). “The Baker’s Daughter was a constant warm companion to me during cross-country travels, a novel I looked forward to returning to night after night. ... (meer)The rare book in which the modern-day story is as compelling as the wartime tale it contains, The Baker’s Daughter offers a look at Nazi Germany through the lens of the immigration issues of our own time. El Paso, TX and Garmisch, Germany make for an unexpected harmony of flavors.” —Jenna Blum, international bestselling author of The Stormchasers and Those Who Save Us

Please join us at the Bookshop on Sunday, February 19th at 3 pm as we welcome Sarah McCoy, reading from her latest novel, "The Baker's Daughter". In 1945, Elsie Schmidt was a naive teenager, as eager for her first sip of champagne as she was for her first kiss. She and her family have been protected ... (meer)from the worst of the terror and desperation overtaking her country by a high-ranking Nazi who wishes to marry her. So when an escaped Jewish boy arrives on Elsie’s doorstep in the dead of night on Christmas Eve, Elsie understands that opening the door would put all she loves in danger. Sixty years later, in El Paso, Texas, Reba Adams is trying to file a feel-good Christmas piece for the local magazine. Reba is perpetually on the run from memories of a turbulent childhood, but she’s been in El Paso long enough to get a full-time job and a fiancé, Riki Chavez. Riki, an agent with the U.S. Border Patrol, finds comfort in strict rules and regulations, whereas Reba feels that lines can often be blurred. Reba’s latest assignment has brought her to the shop of an elderly baker across town. The interview should take a few hours at most, but the owner of Elsie’s German Bakery is no easy subject. Reba finds herself returning to the bakery again and again, anxious to find the heart of the story. For Elsie, Reba’s questions are a stinging reminder of darker times: her life in Germany during that last bleak year of WWII. And as Elsie, Reba, and Riki’s lives become more intertwined, all are forced to confront the uncomfortable truths of the past and seek out the courage to forgive. Author Sarah McCoy graduated from Virginia Tech with a BA in journalism and public relations and Old Dominion University with an MFA in creative writing fiction. She has taught writing at Old Dominion University and the University of Texas at El Paso. She is also the author of "The Time it Snowed in Puerto Rico."