The Time Left between Us

by Alicia DeFonzo

A blend of memoir, history, and oral storytelling, The Time Left between Us bridges the gap between the generation who fought World War II and the generation who has forgotten it. Alicia DeFonzo takes an unplanned visit to the Normandy beaches while staying in Paris. Her grandfather “Del” (Anthony DelRossi) had fought in World War II, and she becomes distraught after realizing how little she knows about the war and his experiences, which until then had remained largely unspoken.

Across landscapes and lifetimes DeFonzo retraces her beloved grandfather’s tour through World War II Europe. The eighty-four-year-old DelRossi recounts stories as an army combat engineer surviving major campaigns, including Normandy, St. Lo, the Bulge, Hürtgenwald, and Remagen, then liberating concentration camps. In this braided narrative, we see DeFonzo’s childhood in a traditional Italian American family with an erratic Marine Corps father and a beloved grandfather. Spanning ten years, DeFonzo’s travels and research take an unexpected detour after she inherits a Nazi Waffen-SS diary from her grandfather, and, in her final trip, returns to Germany to confront the diary owner’s family. DeFonzo’s and her grandfather’s stories merge when Del undergoes open-heart surgery and Alicia must be the one to safeguard the past.

Both nostalgic and gripping, The Time Left between Us is a meditation on how deeply connected the past is to the present and how the truth—and what we remember of it—are fragmented.

222 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 1, 2022

About the author

Alicia DeFonzo is an award-winner professor and author of the WWII nonfiction narrative The Time Left Between Us (Potomac Books, 2022). Featured on CNBC and NPR, DeFonzo has been the literary guest for the 80th anniversary of D-Day ceremonies in Normandy as well as the Battle of the Bulge celebration by the Ambassador of Luxembourg. Library Journal calls her debut book “a deeply personal venture but also one of significant importance now and for all future generations to learn from.”

DeFonzo is currently adapting her book to a limited TV series, a Winner at the Cannes World Film Awards 2024. Her screenwriting has received multiple accolades from Netflix, Disney, MAX, and Marvel Universe jurors at Austin Film Festival (2024), UK Film Awards (2024 & 2025), and Lonely Wolf (2024).

DeFonzo is a Senior Lecturer of Writing and Literature at Old Dominion University as well as former Fulbright Specialist. She is also a frequent literary guest and contributing writer to NPR programs and regional expert on banned books and literary censorship.