The Vanishing Moon by Joseph Coulson

The backdrop is World War I, and America is flirting with the prospects of war. Like many other middle class, American families, the Tollmans are blithe and prosperous during the American Industrialization. However, as the summer of 1931 approaches, and the Great Depression looms over hundreds of thousands of starving, unemployed families, Stephen and his family are experiencing the suffering and poverty first hand. As their erratic father loses his job, and their beautiful mother’s eyesight slowly slips away, they are forced to move away from their desolate hometown of Cleveland. Stephen and his family spend a tragic year in a tent surrounded by brittle, broken trees that mock their dreams, and reveal to the young Tollman children that the past is a shadow and aspirations are dangerous.

“Your brother may want something from you… Not yet. But someday he will. He’ll need what you have.” While the country becomes engulfed in the Second World War, Katherine Lennox enters Stephen’s life. She was the manifestation of contemporary women of the war: an exceptional pianist with a black bob, a chain smoking political activist, a revolutionary communist. Despite Katherine’s love for the fair and mild Stephen and his detached affection, his shadowy, rogue brother, Phil, ensnares her. Stephen must step aside as he, once again, slips into his brother’s shadow.

Joseph Coulson’s book leads the reader through a two generation journey from the evocative perspectives of Stephen Tollman, Katherine Lennox, and Phil Tollman’s teenage son. The Vanishing Moon illustrates the triumphs and hardships of those who confront love and war.