In a major suspense novel set to surpass the internationally bestselling An Instance of the Fingerpost comes a dazzling story of youth, love and murderous ambition—a novel of time travel spanning three beautifully detailed worlds: the intellectual spires of Oxford in 1960, an ancient Arcadian world, and a dystopian future.

In 1960, Henry Lytten is an Oxford don who dabbles in espionage and fiction writing. Rosie Wilson is the quick-witted, curious 15-year-old girl who feeds Professor Lytten's cat. Several hundred years in the future, living in a dystopian society on the Isle of Mull, is Angela Meerson—a brilliant psychomathematician who has discovered the world-changing potential of a powerful new machine. Somewhere, sometime, is Jay—a scholar's apprentice in an idyllic, pastoral land. Who these people really are, and how their stories come together, will be revealed in Iain Pears's fascinating great puzzle of a novel.