When your life changes in a moment, how do you rewrite your story? In 1940s Britain, with the Second World War raging, Alice is working in a laboratory developing a new miracle medicine. Made to leave school at sixteen and abandon her aspiration to be a teacher, she learns instead how curing people may be her destiny. In the present day, Jo, already in a failing marriage, is devastated when she hears her daughter's life is on a knife edge. At her bedside Jo starts to read Alice's diary, found the previous day in a vintage handbag. A door opens onto the past, revealing a young woman's fierce determination to succeed against all odds. Past and present overlap and merge as life-changing events resonate across the gulf of time. This is a story of a mother whose life is blown apart. Now she must find a way to put it back together. Can Alice show her the way? "I devoured this book. The characters are rich and their stories compelling." - Goodreads reviewer "This is a tale that will wring your heart and feed your soul. Don't pass it up!" - I'm a Voracious Reader "Timeless themes, beautifully packaged." - Something by Jane