When she is just a child, Josie Langley is thrown out of her family home with her disgraced father. Her grandfather, whose thriving shipyard was once the pride of Victorian Monkwearmouth, has never forgiven his eldest son for marrying Josie's mother, the serving girl.

Moving from Sunderland to London where she and her mother find kitchen work, Josie struggles against poverty and misfortune -as well as the relentless acts of vengeance of one of the workers sacked from the shipyard who has vowed to hunt the family down.

Courageous and determined, Josie fights back when she is almost in the gutter.

Then her past catches up with her. Lured back to Sunderland, she meets the two men who are to have a devastating impact on her life.

'Colourful . . . authentic . . . in the bestselling tradition of Catherine Cookson.' Middlesbrough Evening Gazette