Captain Laurence Greene was gassed at Ypres and takes ten years to die. During that time Effie Shaw works as his cook, while mourning her fiancé Joseph, believed to have died heroically in France. After Laurence's death, Effie inherits a tea shop, a railway ticket and an unexpected declaration of love, but his will also requires her to travel to Ypres and visit Joseph's grave. Following Laurence's wartime diary, she discovers that the truth about Joseph's fate is very different from what she was told. Her journey from Passchendaele to Paris reconnects the stories of three soldiers and reveals how deeply the First World War continued to affect those who survived it.

Caroline Scott

Those Measureless Fields: A First World War Story