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Debby Lee is a new-to-me author making her first appearance on the podcast this week. Her fascinating new book, Beneath a Peaceful Moon, is part of Barbour Publishing’s Heroines of WWII series, and looks at the role of Native Americans in winning WWII, both as spies and as code talkers. We chat about Debby’s visit to Arizona to do research, how much Debby, a Native American herself, knows of the Navajo and Yakima languages, and how she went above and beyond (really above and beyond!) in her research.
Patrons will get to hear about some of the sad things that happened to Native Americans even after the war, including to Debby’s own family, and the repercussions that are still being felt today.
Beneath a Peaceful Moon by Debby Lee
Mary Wishram, an orphaned Yakima tribal member, aches for her brother who suffers in a POW camp in the Philippine Islands and her Japanese friends who languish in a relocation center. Determined to end the war by any means necessary, she employs her language skills to become a spy. Leaving Camp Pendleton for the South Pacific, she faces escalating threats of peril to help bring her loved ones home.
John Painted Horse, a proud Navajo, struggles with the loss of his father who died in WWI for a country that didn’t consider him a United States citizen. Though his home state doesn’t offer him the right to vote, he joins the Code Talker program at Camp Pendleton. Thrust into mounting danger in the South Pacific, he hopes to bring long overdue recognition and honor to his people, no matter the cost.
Will these two wounded souls find healing from their past traumas and a deeper relationship with God, before it’s too late? Or will they lose their chance at love, and everything they hold dear?
Get your copy of Beneath a Peaceful Moon by Debby Lee.
More from the Heroines of WWII series:
The Cryptographer’s Dilemma by Johnnie Alexander
Picture of Hope by Liz Tolsma
Saving Mrs. Roosevelt by Candice Sue Patterson
Mrs. Witherspoon Goes to War by Mary Davis
A Rose for the Resistance by Angela K. Couch
Season of My Enemy by Naomi Musch
The Escape Game by Marilyn Turk
Escape from Amsterdam by Lauralee Bliss
On My Honor by Patty Hall
The Starlet Spyby Rachel Scott McDaniel
Debby Lee, a member of the Yakama tribe, started writing as a child but never forgets home, the cozy town of Toledo, Washington, and her Native American roots.
A former president of the Olympia chapter of Romance Writers of America, Debby enjoys participating in both RWA and the American Christian Fiction Writers. Her full length title, Beneath a Peaceful Moon, releases June 1, 2023, with Barbour Publishing. She also has six novella collections with Barbour. The Courageous Brides and Mountain Christmas Brides both made the ECPA Bestsellers list.
A self-professed nature lover, Debby feels like a hippie child who wasn’t born early enough to attend Woodstock. She wishes she could run barefoot all year long and often does when weather permits. During football season, she cheers on the Seattle Seahawks with other devoted fans. She’s also filled with wanderlust and dreams of traveling the world.