I'll Be Seeing You

"I'll be seeing you." These are the words French teenager Catherine Bresson reads at the end of every letter sent to her by Alexander Lowenstein, a young American just out of the army, after they meet in Paris at the close of WWI. Little does she know it will take thirty years before those words come true. Spanning the years between 1919 and 1950, the novel explores love, family pressure, friendship and loyalty, and the ugly presence of anti-Semitism in France at that time.

After meeting briefly in Paris and falling instantly in love with Alexander Lowenstein, an American, naive and determined Catherine Bresson defies her father's objections by continuing to write to her American suitor who is insistent in his pledge to return to her. When Alex is manipulated into marriage by his girlfriend, Catherine puts her feelings for him aside and eventually marries Gerard Cremieux, a young Jewish law student from her village in the south of France. Their lives go on separately, Alex as a high school teacher in New York and Catherine as a young wife. When Gerard dies unexpectedly, Catherine, overcome with grief, reaches out to Alex and their long-distance love affair begins again through once-a-year letters until Alex can divorce his wife. When the Nazis invade the south of France, Catherine's life is thrown into turmoil because of the smoldering anti-Semitism there. It is only after the war that pure happenstance reunites her with the man who promised to return to her thirty years before.

Myrna Laracuente is a retired New York City high school teacher. She loves all things French and travels to France as often as possible. She lives in New Jersey and volunteers two days a week for The Seeing Eye in Morristown. Her novel is based on the true-life love affair between her uncle and the French woman who would become his second wife. She lives with her Portuguese Podengo, Daisy.