From the wildly popular bestselling author of The Keeper of Lost Things—an uplifting, slightly magical story about how it’s never too late to find out who you really are.

"Ruth Hogan is the queen of uplifting fiction and Madame Burova reminds us why. The writing crackles with humor and warmth. I can't imagine a better book in which to lose yourself at the moment. Stunning, immersive and absolutely wonderful." --Annie Lyons, author of The Brilliant Life of Eudora Honeysett

Madame Burova—beloved Tarot reader, palmist, and clairvoyant—is retiring and leaving her booth on the Brighton seafront.

After inheriting her mother’s fortune-telling business as a young woman, Imelda Burova has spent her life on the Brighton pier practicing her trade. She and her trusty pack of Tarot cards have seen the lovers and the liars, the angels and the devils, the dreamers and the fools. Now, after a lifetime of keeping other people’s secrets, Madam Burova is ready to have a little piece of life for herself. But she still has one last thing to do—to fulfill a promise made in the 1970s, when she and her girlfriends were carefree, with their whole lives still before them.

In London, it is time for another woman to make a fresh start. Billie has lost her university job, her marriage, and her place in the world when a sudden and unlikely discovery leaves her very identity in question. Determined to find answers, she must follow a trail…which leads to Brighton, the pier, and directly to Madame Burova’s door.

In a story spanning over fifty years, Ruth Hogan has conjured a magical world of 1970s holiday camps and seaside entertainers, eccentrics, heroes and villains, the lost and the found. Young people will make careless choices which echo down the years….but it’s never too late to put things right. 

Ruth Hogan describes herself as a “rapacious reader, writer, and incorrigible magpie” whose own love of small treasures and curiosities and the people around her inspired her first novel. She lives north of London.

"Ruth Hogan is the queen of uplifting fiction and Madame Burova reminds us why. Each character is lovingly crafted, their stories beautifully and heartbreakingly woven into something magical. The writing crackles with humor and warmth whilst not being afraid to tackle the harsh realities of racism in the 1970s. It's the kind of story you want to devour greedily but then feel bereft that you won't get to spend more time with Imelda, Cillian, Billie, Treasure, and all the other glorious characters. I can't imagine a better book in which to lose yourself at the moment. Stunning, immersive and absolutely wonderful." — Annie Lyons, author of The Brilliant Life of Eudora Honeysett

"Woke up early to finish this breathtakingly beautiful story. Ruth Hogan's Madame Burova is absolutely wonderful." — Celia Anderson, author of The Cottage of Curiosities

“From the attention-grabbing opening paragraph, to the joyful conclusion, Ruth Hogan has stirred together a charming fairytale in which the people may be more lost than the things; and generosity and compassion may be the key to finding a way home. Also there are dogs. Delightful.”  — Helen Simonson, author of The Summer Before the War and Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand, on The Keeper of Lost Things

“A beautiful story of love, loss, and the redemptive power of friendship.”  — Catherine Hall, author of The Proof of Love, on The Keeper of Lost Things

“Hogan’s writing has the soothing warmth of the cups of cocoa and tea her characters regularly dispense…old-fashioned storytelling with a sprinkling of magic.”  — Kirkus on The Keeper of Lost Things

“Hogan’s first novel reveals how even discarded items have significance and seemingly random objects, people, and places are all interconnected.”  — Booklist on The Keeper of Lost Things

“[A] gentle tale about kindness and redemption, wherein lost souls and lost objects get rejoined in unusual ways to restore people’s happiness and even lay ghosts to rest in a feel-good debut novel that’s hard to walk away from.”  — New York Journal of Books on The Keeper of Lost Things