1950s London. Bloomsbury Books has resisted change for a hundred years, run by men and guided by the manager's unbreakable rules. But after the turmoil of war in Europe, the world is changing and the women in the shop have plans. The brilliant Vivien Lowry, still grieving her fiance who was killed in action, has a long list of grievances, the biggest of which is Alec McDonough, the head of fiction... Featuring literary figures of the time, among them Daphne du Maurier, Samuel Beckett and Peggy Guggenheim.