Dear America - Like the Willow Tree

My name is Lydia. This is my story. . . .In 1918, as the Great War rages in Europe, the

Spanish influenza tears a brutal path across the United

States, leaving devastation in its wake. Suddenly, eleven year-

old Lydia Pierce and her older brother, Daniel, find

themselves orphans of the flu, and are taken by their

grieving uncle to be raised in the Shaker community at

Sabbathday Lake. Thrust into the Shakers’ unfamiliar

way of life, Lydia, a fiercely independent girl, must

grapple with a new world that is nothing like the

one she used to know.

Lydia must work hard, and all the while she

worries about her headstrong brother, who has run away.

In time, and with her courageous spirit, Lydia learns to

find the joy in living with the Shakers—yet she cannot

stop wondering, will Daniel ever return?