The Glass Ocean: A Novel

From the New York Times bestselling authors of The Forgotten Room comes a captivating historical mystery, infused with romance, that links the lives of three women across a centurytwo deep in the past, one in the presentto the doomed passenger liner, RMS Lusitania. May 2013 Her finances are in dire straits and bestselling author Sarah Blake is struggling to find a big idea for her next book. Desperate, she breaks the one promise she made to her Alzheimers-stricken mother and opens an old chest that belonged to her great-grandfather, who died when the RMS Lusitania was sunk by a German U-Boat in 1915. What she discovers there could change history. Sarah embarks on an ambitious journey to England to enlist the help of John Langford, a recently disgraced Member of Parliament whose family archives might contain the only key to the long-ago catastrophe. . . . April 1915 Southern belle Caroline Telfair Hochstetters marriage is in crisis. Her formerly attentive industrialist husband, Gilbert, has become remote, pre-occupied with business . . . and something else that she cant quite put a finger on. Shes hoping a trip to London in Lusitanias lavish first-class accommodations will help them reconnectbut she cant ignore the spark she feels for her old friend, Robert Langford, who turns out to be on the same voyage. Feeling restless and longing for a different existence, Caroline is determined to stop being a bystander, and take charge of her own life. . . . Tessa Fairweather is traveling second-class on the Lusitania, returning home to Devon. Or at least, thats her story. Tessa has never left the United States and her English accent is a hasty fake. Shes really Tennessee Schaff, the daughter of a roving con man, and she can steal and forge just about anything. But shes had enough. Her partner has promised that if they can pull off this one last heist aboard the Lusitania, theyll finally leave the game behind. Tess desperately wants to believe that, but Tess has the uneasy feeling theres something about this job that isnt as it seems. . . . As the Lusitania steams toward its fate, three women work against time to unravel a plot that will change the course of their own lives . . . and history itself.