When her friend and business partner Edwin Brown dies, it seems like Katherine Carter's own world has ended. Not only has her closest companion been taken from her, she's also lost the successful restaurant they build up together and the comfortable home they shared with her young son, for Edwin has left no will. And his lecherous brother Gerald presumes he's inherited Katherine along with the house.

With little money but full of determination, Katherine escapes Gerald's violent advances and takes lodgings in Dockhands London. Despite its poverty, the town is full of hope and friendship, and Katherine finally begins to tackle her troubled past. But even as she rebuilds her life around the pie-and-mash shop where she works, a terrible shadow is hanging over the country. And little does anyone know the horrors 1914 will unleash.