Contemporary Authors

• Love of Finished Years: A Novel - December 26, 2017 Sillan Pace Brown Publishing,

• Gregory Erich Phillip - https://www.gregoryerichphillips.com/about/

  MEET GREGORY
  Author
  Gregory Erich Phillips writes stories with strong characters whose lives, with their many challenges and joys, resonate with a wide audience. Raised in a literary family, Gregory began writing at the age of fourteen. His first novel, Love of Finished Years, won the Chaucer Award for historical fiction and the grand prize in the Chanticleer Reviews International Writing Competition. It was praised by Publishers Weekly, which called it “beguiling.” His second novel, The Exile, will be published by Koehler Books in March of 2019.

  A Modern Gentleman
  Known as the “Tango Guy” in Seattle, Washington, Gregory has impressed audiences from the West Coast to New York City with his drama and grace on the dance floor (visit Moonlight Tango to see him in action). By day, he is a mortgage broker and admits that a suit and tie is his preferred choice of attire. In his spare time if he isn’t dancing, he can be found playing the violin, singing or hiking.

  Gregory lives in Seattle, Washington with Rachel: his wife, tango partner and muse.

Print Marked Items
Love of Finished Years
Publishers Weekly.
265.19 (May 7, 2018): p46.
COPYRIGHT 2018 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Love of Finished Years
Gregory Erich Phillips. Sillan Pace Brown Publishing, $18.95 trade paper (312p) ISBN 978-1-64058-011-4
Phillips's beguiling novel follows a young German immigrant woman weathering the dangers of factory
work in pre-WWI America. Elsa Schuller lives with her mother and sister in New York's Lower East Side
and works in a shirtwaist factory to help support her family. After a horrific fire results in the death of many
factory workers and forces the factory to close, Elsa finds employment as a maid and German translator in
the Long Island home of the Graham family. Elsa is also a companion to the Grahams' spoiled daughter,
Dafne, their friendship crossing a social divide. When Dafne becomes engaged to handsome neighbor Glenn
Streppy, she moves to New York City with Elsa so that she can.be closer to Glenn, who has joined the Army
and trains in Brooklyn. Yet Glenn's devotion to Army life and Dafne's desire to immerse herself in New
York's social scene causes a deep fracture in their romance, eventually causing Elsa to find new
employment. Phillips's portrayal of the gritty reality of early-20th-century immigrant life has impressive
scope, eventually weaving in the devastating effects of World War I on the characters. Readers will be
satisfied by this novel's fast-paced plotting and its memorable characters. (BookLife)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Love of Finished Years." Publishers Weekly, 7 May 2018, p. 46. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A538858660/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=bcbdba53.
Accessed 19 Oct. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A538858660

• Chanticleer Book Reviews
  https://www.chantireviews.com/2018/05/04/love-of-finished-years-by-gregory-erich-phillips-historical-fiction-literary-wwi/
  Word count: 724

  An immigrant’s journey, a forbidden love, a war to end all wars collide on the pages of a beautifully written historical fiction, Love of Finished Years by Gregory Erich Phillips.

  At twelve years of age, Elsa Schuller carries no expectations when she reaches Ellis Island in 1905. In fact, she has no idea why her father insists on leaving Germany for this supposed Land of Opportunity. Riddled with nothing less than challenges and hardship working in the sweatshops in lower Manhattan, Elsa’s only ray of hope is learning how to read and write English.

  Her studying pays off when she’s hired seven years later to work as a maid and translator for an upper-middle-class family, the Grahams, on Long Island. For the first time, Elsa begins to dream of something more than the ragged gray life she and her family have lived thus far.

  Elsa is not quite sure what to make of Dafne, the Grahams’ ebullient yet impulsive seventeen-year-old daughter, who disregards class distinction and is fascinated by Elsa. After a time, the maid and her mistress become good friends. A few years later, Dafne becomes engaged to a close friend to both Dafne and Elsa, Glenn Streppy.

  Unfortunately, their engagement is overshadowed by the war that is brewing. And to Dafne’s disappointment, Glenn enlists in the army. It doesn’t help that he unexpectantly catches her with his best friend when he tries to visit her while on leave from his military responsibilities.

  Glenn cuts off all contact with Dafne, which saddens Elsa as she misses his friendship. In a daring move, Elsa visits him at his stationing post just before his transfer to Europe. It is during this short visit she realizes that she is in love with him. Moreover, Glen reciprocates her adoration. While Dafne successfully snubbed the social mores of the day, Elsa cannot. She is still just an immigrant from a poor family—a poor German family—and has no right to fall in love with a man of standing.

  While guarding her emotions, Elsa has something even worse to consider: the reality that this encounter may very well mark the last time she’ll ever see her dear friend, Glenn, alive.

  Award-winning author Gregory Erich Phillips produces a poignant early 20th-century plot. So much more than your typical love story, Love of Finished Years raises readers’ consciences and invites them to consider the realities of a time not too long ago (and in some ways, still relevant in today’s discourses on immigration) when people were divided not only by language but by the social mores and their class in American society, but also between rich and poor, “citizen” and “immigrant,” male and female.

  Incorporating various themes into his absorbing plot, Phillips highlights the importance of workers’ rights (Triangle Shirtwaist Factory) the Women’s Suffrage movement; and the plight of immigrants, especially during The Great War. Some examples include the use of propaganda against the American Germans (via Liberty Bonds); again, the use of propaganda to boost American support, and the immorality of war.

  Laced with a well-defined cast, Love of Finished Years opens at a critical moment in Elsa’s life before taking readers back in time to her arrival to America followed by a chronological lead up to her relationship with Glenn and Dafne. Key to Phillips four-part storyline is his use of genteel dialogue—typical of that era—to build emotional tension not only between his primary characters but secondary characters as well.

  From the riveting opening that takes place in NYC’s Lower East Side’s sweatshops until its gripping conclusion, this enthralling novel vividly portrays the desperate times of German immigrants landing at Ellis Island in 1905 in search of a better life. A timely read, illuminating the issues we are still experiencing a century later, Phillips reminds us that love, light, and perseverance can help us find a way to overcome almost any obstacle.

  Love of Finished Years is destined to claim a spot alongside our favorite reads. Love of Finished Years was awarded the Chanticleer Grand Prize while still in manuscript form. It has since been traditionally published by the Sillan Pace Brown Group.

• Readers Favorite
  https://readersfavorite.com/book-review/love-of-finished-years
  Word count: 272

  In 1909, Elsa Schuller was sixteen years old, living in the Lower East Side of New York City with her German immigrant family. Four years previously, her parents, Tobias and Nina, her older sister, Sonja, and baby brother, Anton, crossed the ocean to find a better life in America. But life was hard and tragedy struck the family. Elsa was unable to go to school, as she and Sonja had to work in a factory to help with necessary expenses. Elsa found a way to learn the English language. This helped her to find a job in Lindenhurst, Long Island; she was a maid and a German translator for the father, an attorney with several German clients. Elsa also assisted Dafne, the adolescent daughter. In the novel Love of Finished Years, written by Gregory Erich Phillips, the history of German immigrants is beautifully illustrated. When America was drawn into World War II, German immigrants were viewed with suspicion – and Elsa’s life changed dramatically, yet again.

  The author has skillfully portrayed the plight of immigrants during a most difficult time in American history. He has included characters from both the upper class of people, who had the means to hire servants, and the serving class themselves. By fully developing characters from each class, the reader learns the societal norms of the day. His depiction of the factory workers, as well as the suffragettes and union representatives, is also well-written. The story is engaging and captivating. Gregory Erich Phillips’ fictional work, Love of Finished Years, is an excellent read for anyone interested in learning more about the early twentieth century.