Beneath the Veil of Smoke and Ash

Author: Tammy Pasterick
Genre: Historical Fiction
Publisher: She Writes Press, 2021
Pages: 392
Rating: Highly Recommend

Synopsis: It's Pittsburgh, 1910 - the golden age of steel in the land of opportunity. Eastern European immigrants Janos and Karina Kovac should be prospering, but their American dream is fading faster then the colors on the sun-drenched flag of their adopted country. Janos is exhausted from a decade of twelve-hour shifts, seven days per week, at the local mill. Karina, meanwhile, thinks she has found an escape from their run-down ethnic neighborhood in the modern home of the mill manager - until she discovers she is expected to perform duties of both housekeeper and mistress. Though she resents her employer's advances, they are more tolerable than being groped by drunks at the town's boardinghouse.

When Janos witnesses a gruesome incident at his furnace on the same day Karina learns she will lose her job, the Kovac family begins to unravel. Janos learns there are people at the mill who pose a greater risk to his life than the work itself, while Karina - panicked at the thought of returning to work at the boarding house - becomes unhinged and wreaks a path of destruction so wide that her children are swept up in the storm. In the
aftermath, Janos must rebuild his shattered family with the help of an unlikely ally.

Review: In seventh grade I read The Valley of Decision by Marcia Davenport, and I've re-read it at least once in the years since. I keep looking for the next The Valley of Decision. Carnegie's Maid wasn't quite it, and honestly, neither was Beneath the Veil of Smoke and Ash. However, this was a really good book. Once I started reading, I could put it down. 

I wish the author would have used more local landmarks and dropped more names of local interest/recognition, but the story itself kept me entertained and turning pages.

I also loved that there was a newly released historical fiction novel that didn't incorporate a dual timeline.