When Anstice Barrett's father dies, she discovers at twenty-six that she has been left almost penniless and utterly alone in the world. With few options and less experience, she makes the desperate choice to marry Justin Holme, a bitter widower she barely knows, who needs someone to raise his three uncontrollable children while he escapes to sea. What begins as a practical arrangement becomes something far more complicated: a household where Anstice must win over children who have already lost one mother, navigate a marriage without love, and carve out a place for herself in a world that offers her no safety net. Le Feuvre writes with quiet precision about the small daily victories and defeats of building a life from nothing, and the unlikely courage required to stay when staying is hard. The novel moves at the pace of patience, but its heart beats strong.
