Alice is running a successful podcast about mud-larking in London when she starts finding pieces of pottery with her name on them. Years ago her brother disappeared with no trace so these start seeming like messages to her. And when she meets other people whose loved ones had just disappeared as well, she stats wondering if something weird is happening - especially when she meets a young mudlark who seem to be from another place and time. Before long she boards a train and ends up in 1945 - where things start getting even weirder.

I love time travel stories and I expected to like this one. Its first part is almost too sedate - it sets the stage for the rest but once Alice is back in time, things speed up - we even get to meet Churchill :) I am not sure what I liked more - the story that happened in 1945 with all its details and texture or the actual story that ran on top of that (not so) idyllic one.

And the end is almost heart-breaking - she finds her brother indeed - that's how all that started but the way and the time it happens at is like a tragic coda to a play that already plays a lot on one's feelings.

PS: A mudlark is someone who scavenges in river mud for items of value, a term used especially to describe those who scavenged this way in London during the late 18th and 19th centuries. (Wikipedia) ( )