"After an internship at the Barter Theatre in Virginia, where she learned 'some of the most valuable lessons as a writer I have ever had,' Settle moves to New York, where she lands a modeling job during the glamorous time of the World's Fair. She vividly depicts a long vanished world, 'peopled with White Russians, aristocratic English women and ancient splay-footed nannies: We were not aware yet that everything we took for granted was disappearing or changing, like a shaken kaleidoscope, not of colors but time and sound and habit and decision.' She recounts through exquisite detail and language how her roles as a wartime bride and young mother, a signals operator with the Women's Auxiliary of the Royal Air Force, and freelance journalist, forged her commitment to becoming a writer. Filled with adventure and insight, this is a delightfully literate recounting of a life lived to its fullest."—Publishers Weekly