A colony of moss does not express preferences for certain people, living or dead. But if such a colony of moss did decide to reveal its favourites, let us just say You might be surprised.In 2018, a young forensic scientist, homesick and adrift in the North of England, is heading to a coroner's office to identify a body.In 50 BCE, a female druid is travelling to a city in the South where she will appear before the new king.And underfoot, all along, a teeming colony of moss is opening its wet mouth, waiting.In this wonderfully strange, multi-layered story, the unexpected discovery of an ancient bog body becomes a pinprick of light in the depths of humanity's history.

When Patsy gets her long-coveted visa to America, it comes after years of yearning to leave Pennyfield, the beautiful but impoverished Jamaican town where she was raised. More than anything, Patsy wishes to be reunited with her oldest friend, Cicely, whose letters arrive from New York steeped in the promise of a happier life and the possible rekindling of their young love. But Patsy’s plans don’t include her overzealous, evangelical mother―or even her five-year-old daughter, Tru. Beating with the pulse of a long-witheld confession, Patsy gives voice to a woman who looks to America for the opportunity to choose herself first―not to give a better life to her family back home. Patsy leaves Tru behind in a defiant act of self-preservation, hoping for a new start where she can be, and love, whomever she wants. But when Patsy arrives in Brooklyn, America is not as Cicely’s treasured letters described; to survive as an undocumented immigrant, she is forced to work as a bathroom attendant and nanny. Meanwhile, Tru builds a faltering relationship with her father back in Jamaica, grappling with her own questions of identity and sexuality, and trying desperately to empathize with her mother’s decision. Expertly evoking the jittery streets of New York and the languid rhythms of Jamaica, Patsy weaves between the lives of Patsy and Tru in vignettes spanning more than a decade as mother and daughter ultimately find a way back to one another.

One fateful night in Sparta, a young slave girl encounters a mysterious, grey-eyed princess. Melantho and Penelope, though from different worlds, are instantly connected. But betrayal soon tears them apart.Years later, on Ithaca's rocky shores, Melantho is sent to serve Princess Penelope and her new husband, Prince Odysseus. Hardened by slavery, Melantho vows to stay distant from Penelope. Yet, the undeniable pull between them proves stronger than ever.As war ignites Greece, Odysseus and Ithaca's men are called away and, in their absence, Melantho finds a new world opening up before her – one where women rule, where family can be found, and where love is finally given the space to bloom.But all wars eventually end and as Troy falls, Penelope and Melantho must face the King’s return and decide how far they will go to protect what matters most to them.