Fallen Grace

Grace Parkes has just had to do a terrible
thing. Having given birth to an illegitimate child, she has travelled to the
famed Brookwood Cemetery to place her small infant's body in a rich lady's
coffin. Following the advice of a kindly midwife, this is the only way that
Grace can think of to give something at least to the little baby who died at
birth, and to avoid the ignominy of a pauper's grave. Distraught and weeping,
Grace meets two people at the cemetery: Mrs Emmeline Unwin and Mr James Solent.
These two characters will have a profound affect upon Grace's life. But Grace
doesn't know that yet. For now, she has to suppress her grief and get on with
the business of living: scraping together enough pennies selling watercress for
rent and food; looking after her older sister, who is incapable of caring for
herself; thwarting the manipulative and conscience-free Unwin family, who are as
capable of running a lucrative funeral business as they are of defrauding a
young woman of her fortune. A stunning evocation of life in Victorian London,
with vivid and accurate depictions, ranging from the deprivation that the truly
poor suffered to the unthinking luxuries enjoyed by the rich: all bound up with
a pacy and thrilling plot, as Grace races to unravel the fraud about to be
perpetrated against her and her sister.