A moving novel that tells the story of a unique unit of the Women’s Army Corps serving overseas during World War II—the 6888th, a multiethnic battalion that was predominantly African American and included women of Caribbean, Puerto Rican, and Mexican heritage.“Just the novel to elevate these unforgettable voices.”—Shelf Awareness

In the wake of the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, Dorothy Thom—a Spelman graduate, librarian, and Francophile—joins the Women’s Army Corps, wanting to do her part for the war effort. Longing for adventure, she has one question for the recruiter: “Do you think I’ll get to go abroad?”As Dorothy and her sister WACs discover, life in the army is an adventure filled with unexpected deprivations and culture shock. Finally, in early 1945, she and eight hundred African American WACs are sent across the turbulent North Atlantic to their post in England where they are assigned to process mail sent to GIs from their loved ones back home—an estimated seventeen million pieces. As Dorothy and her fellow soldiers discover, many of the letters had been stockpiled in poor conditions for more than two years, making the addressee names nearly illegible.While overseas, these WACs traverse a landscape of unimagined possibilities. With their outlooks changed forever, they return to the United States as the catalysts for change in America and build lives that transcend anything their ancestors ever dreamed of. No Better Time illuminates a love of country and duty that has been overlooked until now.