Reaching from late 19th-century Cumbria to the present, this elegiac novel celebrates two spirited women: Grace, a farm labourer’s daughter who fatefully followed her heart; and Mary, the child she was forced to give up.

According to Mary’s son, these two women are unsung heroines. And, as his elderly mother’s mind begins to fail, he sets about the task of lovingly recreating their lives and the vanished country of their pasts, linking three generations in a chain of enduring love, loss and courage.