Excerpt from All the Little Hopes by Leah Weiss, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

Daddy's eyes stay on the road where the dust settles. He doesn't look at Mama. "I don't think it works like that."

"What do you mean? Isn't that what you signed? That's part of the deal, isn't it? Our boys come home safe?"

"I know what you think it means, Minnie, but because our boys can come home doesn't mean they will."

"Why in the world not?" Her voice jabs. "Won't they feel lucky to work bees instead of fighting a war that's not ours?"

Daddy looks older than he did a minute ago, and he speaks low. "Civic pride's a powerful adversary, and it's had time to take hold. Everett's been gone a year, and it's been three months since Wade was home. I don't think we can mess with honor and hope beeswax wins."

"You've got to tell em what to do. Tell em we need their help." Her panic builds. "Tell em they won't have to live in mortal danger."

"We don't even know where they are." Daddy turns to face her. "The time they've been gone can change a man in ways we can't understand. If they don't choose to come home, we'll manage. Lucy can do more. I'll pull men from tobacco and hire extras when we render the wax. That's only two times a year."

She glares at Daddy. "You betrayed me, David Brown. You and that slick government man. Y'all were selling something I was buying, and now you're taking it back. Telling me it's not that simple when it is. We need Everett and Wade here. Not over there in some god-forsaken land."

On one side, Daddy speaks the war-truth that's turned our days hard. On the other, Mama wishes on a star like a girl wanting to keep our boys safe. I wish that both sides would go away and today I'd see my big brother come around the corner of the barn. He'd be whistling and he'd swing Lydia and Cora high into the air, and they'd squeal with joy, and he'd tell us a riddle. That's what I want.

Daddy is a peacemaker at heart so he lifts his arms for a hug, but Mama bats him away and locks her jaw. He says, "We'll let the men know, but the decision is theirs. They're old enough to go to war so they're old enough to make up their own minds."

Mama stomps off toward the house, and Daddy heads to the barn. We'll be keeping the two blue stars in our window representing our men in harm's way. Mr. John T. Booker's offer was a misnomer.

Lydia and Cora are near tears to see this argument. It used to be rare to witness fights between our parents. Now it's grown common. I say to Grady, "You gonna stay home and make Mama happy?"

He drops the toothpick on the ground and the three cat's-eye marbles back in his pocket. "I don't rightly know," he says, being honest. "I don't turn eighteen for twenty-six months and eight days. The war might be over by then. I don't want to look like a coward, Lucy. What kind a man chickens out of a war when his buddies are risking it all?"

I shoot back, "A smart man. A live man. A whole man who wants to stay that way."

"I got time to decide," he says, and he walks to the barn where Daddy went. With only us three girls in the yard, Cora and Lydia stop crying. I push them on the swing while the tension in the air dissipates.

I wish Oma were here to comfort Mama, but she died a week back when I was in the hayloft stealing time, reading The Secret at Shadow Ranch. I looked up when the screen door screeched open and watched my mama bring German tea to her mama like she did every afternoon. But this time, Oma's head lolled to the side. Her mouth had gone slack, and Mama dropped the cup of hot tea and it cleaved down the middle, a good life split between Germany and Riverton. Nancy Drew slipped from my fingers, and I lost my place.

Mama lost her place, too.

Chapter 2
BERT: THOUGHTLESS

It's wash day on the last Wednesday in May. Sheets is heavy on the line next to overalls and flannel shirts, flapping in a breeze coming down from the highlands, heading for Asheville. There was this itty-bitty tear in Ma's old sheet, and it's what I'm in need of—­a strip of cloth two lengths of a baby coffin. So being the thoughtless girl I am, I take the edge of that tear, rip it up one way then cross the other till I get what I want. Then I go to my room I share with my older sister, Ruth, and bolt the door.

Excerpted from All the Little Hopes by Leah Weiss. Copyright © 2021 by Leah Weiss. Excerpted by permission of Sourcebooks. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.