London in the aftermath of war children run wild on East End bombsites while their elders strive for better lives in a country beggared by victory Clarence & Bernadette Malcolm have come five thousand miles in search of prosperity but find the Mother Country not at all as has been promised them; Solly & Dora Lazarus too are strangers in a strange land struggling to belong even as they try to make sense of their past; & Michael & Mary Lockhart take with both hands all that the world owes them wherever it leads them whatever the cost In the street markets & tenements of Bethnal Green the three families live & work together in uneasy harmony until Michael shatters the balance between them his hunger for betterment changing the courses of all their lives over decades & generations Reaching across forty years & capturing a city & a people in a time of tumultuous change What Was Promised is a breathtaking novel by a master storyteller