This anthology of poems, prose and religious readings offers an insight into universal emotions at this difficult and painful time. The pieces included can help express grief and anger, but they can also help to understand grieving and the gradual repair of life after losing a loved one.

Five years after Charles II's triumphant return to London there is growing mistrust of his extravagant court and of corruption among his officials - and when a cart laden with gunpowder explodes outside the General Letter Office, it is immediately clear that such an act is more than an expression of outrage at the inefficiency of the postal service. As intelligencer to the Lord Chancellor, Thomas Chaloner cannot understand why a man of known incompetence...