The gripping new WW2 novel, capturing a little-known story of the evacuees sent away by sea, from the NYT bestselling author of The Bird in the Bamboo Cage.

September 1940. In the immediate aftermath of a U-boat attack on an evacuee ship, one lifeboat of terrified survivors endures a fierce storm in the North Atlantic.

June 1940. Three months earlier, two very different women - Alice King, a teacher, and Lily Nicholls, a young widow, confront life-changing choices as Britain prepares for invasion and the devastating Blitz bombing raids begin. In Kent, Alice sees a chance to play a part in the war and volunteers as an escort on the ‘seavac’ ships; in London Lily faces the agonizing decision of whether to keep her children with her as the Blitz begins, or send them to safety in Canada.

The dramatic events of one fateful night in the mid-Atlantic, and the eight unimaginable days that follow, bind the two women together in the most devastating way…