When Teena inherits from a great-great-great aunt she never even knew had existed, little does she realise that she'll need all her wits and determination to survive the perils of time travel, and of being a female in an era when men ruled, with either a birch rod or a leather whip. Taken back through the years Teena becomes an unwilling pawn in the nefarious ambitions of the evil Sir Gregory Hacklebury, who is determined to wed another of Teena's previously unknown ancestors and steal her inheritance, even if to do so means he must dispose of Angelina Spigworth, whose body Teena now inhabits, and which is constantly constrained by tight corsets, abused by most who have contact with her and, apparently, doomed to rot in a forgotten prison cell.