Anna Francis lives in a tall old house with her dad and her doll Penelope. She actually is a refugee, a piece of flotsam washed up in England by the tides of the Great War. Once upon a time, she got a mom and a brother, and they all lived together in the most beautiful city in the globe. But that’s all gone now, and only to her doll will she ever speak of it. And one winter day time, she discovers an interloper in the attic. A son named Luca with yellowish eyes, who’s as alone as she actually is. That time, she’ll lose everything in her existence, and find the only real friend she may ever understand.

“Very good indeed. A great Oxford novel; and the wonderfully conjured period fine detail…The characters are expertly written: they feel absolutely real, and the real-ness evocatively off sets the deftly handled supernatural elements.” ADAM ROBERTS