We are pleased to announce a new e-book edition of FRANCESCA by Donald Finnaeus Mayo, now available from Endeavour Press, the UK’s leading independent digital publisher:
http://endeavourpress.com/books/francesca-donald-f-mayo/
Our own trade paperback edition is also available here: viewBook.at/Francesca_DFMayo
“Perhaps reading it prior to going to bed is not advisable as one might end up staying up rather later than one intends and arrive at work blurry eyed the next day.” —Establishment Post, Singapore
“A full-bodied tale of love and war set against the complex political and commercial landscape of Indonesia in the 70s. It’s a moving and sensitively written story that draws you in from the start.” —Amazon reader review
East Timor, 1975. Indonesian soldiers invade the village of Dili, raping and slaughtering.
A young girl named Francesca sees her parents and two brothers shot and her baby sister taken away.
She escapes, eventually discovered hiding under a pier by a man named Hasan. He has a boat and takes her to the city of Bandakan, hoping his boss, Benny Surikao can help the pretty young girl.
Interwoven in Francesca’s journey are a cast of vividly drawn characters.
Benny is an Indonesian man who facilitates things for the local Americans working in Indonesia for Constar, an oil exploration company. He gets Francesca a position in the home of Dennis Cole, who works for the company.
Amanda Cole, his seventeen-year-old daughter, has been asked not to return to her boarding school in England. She catches the eye of Rollo, Benny’s son, but is not interested in him. When they make a date she forgets about it, causing the young Indonesian much embarrassment when he shows up at her house.
But Amanda only has eyes for Eddie, an older Vietnam vet and helicopter pilot for Constar. They are in love, and this angers Rollo.
Benny’s nephew through marriage, Peter, falls for Francesca, who tells him about what happened to her the day the soldiers came to her village.
Life is starting to look better for everyone in the Reid household, when Eddie is attacked, and a series of events is put in motion that will have life-long consequences for everyone.
Set against a backdrop of endemic political corruption, moral compromise and the pursuit of oil, Francesca is a passionate story of one woman’s struggle against overwhelming odds to shape the country that nearly destroyed her.
Betimes Books 
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