James W. Nichol Book order

How can love survive a brutal time? In 1946 in North America, a child makes a grisly find in a deserted field—a discovery that opens a shuttered window on a secret dating back to the beginning of the turbulent decade. In 1941 in occupied France, Adele Georges's fruitless attempts to learn the whereabouts of her father, captured by the Nazis, lead her to a lonely young German soldier far from home. A spark between them becomes a fire—and a dangerous love affair blooms across enemy lines, dooming Adele to a grim postwar existence as a despised outcast, one of the infamous "horizontal collaborators." Ostracized, tortured, tormented, she chooses a desperate escape, accompanying a war-damaged yet optimistic Allied soldier across an ocean to a new land. But there is no refuge from the past, as Adele's broken heart and shameful secret drive her deeper into despair...and toward a shocking outcome. Part mystery and part love story—an unforgettable and beautifully written novel of secrets, passions, and consequences—Transgression is an exceptional work of power and strange beauty.

The story follows Walker Devereaux, a young man searching for the truth about his parents after being abandoned by his mother. As he navigates life in Toronto as a cab driver, he forms a bond with Krista, a night dispatcher in a wheelchair. Their friendship takes a dark turn when they become targets of another abandoned boy, who has morphed into a violent figure driven by his own traumatic experiences. The narrative explores themes of abandonment, friendship, and the impact of past traumas.