Asunder: Forgotten Love is a historical novel by Janet Sierzant. The story begins in Florence, Italy, in the family home of Antoinette as she was getting ready to move to Milan to study fashion design. While in Milan, Antoinette met Domenico and they fell in love. They were married and had twin boys, but by this time the turmoil of World War II had reached Italy. When the twins were five years old, Mussolini declared that all boys five years and older must train in a military camp called the Sons of the Wolf. Antoinette went home to Florence with the twins to avoid this while Domenico stayed in Milan and joined the Resistance. When the Allied Forces reached Italy, the Nazis destroyed the bridges in Florence to slow them down, and among the casualties are Antoinette and the twins. Domenico rushes to rescue them but can he find them in the overcrowded hospitals of Florence?

Janet Sierzant’s Asunder is a heart-wrenching love story set against the backdrop of the Second World War. The main protagonists are well-developed characters. Antoinette comes across as sympathetic and it’s easy to fall in love with the handsome Domenico. The complex, interesting, and believable emotional tension in this novel is overwhelming because it not only comes from the interaction of the main protagonists themselves but also from outside forces they can’t control. However, it is their emotional journeys that direct the plot. This is an enthralling novel with numerous twists and turns and a completely unexpected ending. It is a captivating story that will hook readers from the moment Antoinette and Domenico meet in Milan up to the last page of the book. Highly recommended.

In Asunder: Forgotten Love by Janet Sierzant, the author has taken a very sensitive subject and period in time and written a most intriguing, heartfelt, and lovely romance that anyone can associate with in current times. The reader’s attention is captured from the first sentence and remains riveted until the last page is read. Along with tears, signs, laughter, and hope, the reader will become part of the cast of characters in the book.

The main characters in this riveting book are Antoinette, her mother Josephine, and her father Gaetano, Gabriella, Ethan Rubenstein, Domenico Defino, Ethan’s sister Rachel, and a variety of other characters that dance through the plot. Janet Sierzant takes each of these characters and weaves her wonderful story around them and with them. The book takes the reader on a beautiful journey through the lives of the main characters and the not-so-important characters but each one brings something to the other’s life; sometimes laughter, sometimes love, sometimes sorrow, and sometimes the unanticipated. The story ends in the most unexpected way and the twist is not what the reader would expect at all. Thank you, Janet, for the most delightful book. Asunder was a very interesting and exciting read and I found it very hard to put down. The author's writing brought the story to life. I really enjoyed it and would recommend it.