A collection of linked stories: The Lady Margaret, The Signaller, Brother John, Lords and Ladies, The White Boat, and Corfe Gate, producing the effect of a novel. There is also a prologue and a coda.

From the back cover of the trade paperback: In the year 1588, Queen Elizabeth of England was assassinated. As a result, when the Spanish Armada attacked, England went down in defeat, changing the history of Europe and the New World as we know it. Now, in the twentieth century, the Church of Rome reigns supreme over a world of pastoral beauty, while technology is held back to the level of the steam locomotive and the primitive radio. Yet science cannot be suppressed forever, and its advocates are becoming more daring as each year passes. A revolution is building -- one that will rock the foundations of an empire.