Sparky, mischievous, witty, dazzlingly clever' Ali Smith 'A cause for celebration. Here we have a heroine to love, a story we can't let go of' Ann Patchett It had always been my habit-- privately I felt it to be an ecstasy-- to enter, as into a mysterious vault, any public library. 1930s New York is filling with Europe's ousted dreamers, turned overnight into refugees. Rose Meadows, book-loving and orphaned at eighteen, takes a job as assistant to the eccentric Professor Mitwisser. Cast out from Berlin's elite, the Mitwisser family's household is chaotic and Rosie's fate there hangs on the arrival of the Mitwissers' mysterious benefactor, James A'Bair. Inspired by the real Christopher Robin, James is the Bear Boy, the son of a famous children's author. Running from his own fame, James was boy adored by the world but has grown into a bitter man. It falls to Rosie to help them all resist James's reckless orbit.