It is a feel good, well written, captivating story about twenty-four hours in Stella's all night café near Liverpool Street Station. It focuses on two friends, Hannah and Mona who met at a friend's party, and who share a flat together as well as working together at Stella's. They work separate shifts, twelve hours on and twelve hours off but on this day, things begin to change.
It is 12am and the first twelve hours follow Hannah's shift as she watches and serves the lonely, the alone, the happy and the sad. Her own story is revealed through her thoughts: her dreams of becoming a singer; her anguish about her ex-boyfriend, Jaheim, and her long friendship with Mona.
Libby Page also takes several of the customers and illustrates their stories to form a rich patchwork of human relationships e.g. the homeless student, Dan; the couple in their sixties, Martha and Harry and Monique, the first time mother. Cleverly, each story is memorable in its own right.
But it is at 11am when Hannah gets a text from Mona that things begin to change.
When Mona arrives to take over from Hannah, Libby Page picks up her story as the shift progresses, about her dreams of becoming a professional dancer, her relationship with Hannah and the events that have led up to today.
It is a thoroughly engrossing story, and one that I was sorry to finish. I'm looking forward to the next book by Libby Page very much!
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