Deborah Rafferty Oswald

I'm a women's historical fiction author whose books are published by Roan & Weatherford. I love nothing more than researching women's history. I am particularly drawn to the history of the Hudson Valley Region of New York and the extraordinary accomplishments achieved by American women during the twentieth century.

One interesting thing about me is my ability to remember exact dates and details. My friends laugh when I remind them of an outfit they were wearing on a particular day in high school almost fifty years ago! I may not remember where I put my glasses this morning, but I can tell you where I was during the blackout of 1977!

My books follow three generations of the fictional McKenna family of Putnam County, New York. My first book introduced my protagonist, Jay McKenna, who witnessed someone jumping from a biplane over her farm in Brewster, New York, on the day before she was to start at the Haviland Seminary for Girls. For the next four books, I leapfrog back and forth between generations of McKenna women living through the first two world wars, and later, the sweltering summer of 1977, when a serial killer who called himself the Son of Sam terrorized New York City while a power outage resulted in mass looting and destruction of property.

I am currently writing a prequel to the McKenna Series exploring the formation of the first women's labor union set in 1864 Troy, New York, as seen through the eyes of an ancestor of Jay McKenna.

I am happiest when writing or reading women's historical fiction outdoors on the front porch of my home in Putnam County, New York, alongside my pugs, Josephine and Florence, named for two of the main characters in my first book.