When everything you love and trust is destroyed by war, you can give up or you can carry on. Alicia's way is to carry on, and through two wars, illness, death and loss her indomitable spirit sustains her family for generations. From her mother's example, Sara finds the courage to escape an intolerable situation and forge a new life in a new country. "Traces of Dreams" moves from the horrors of the 1914-18 war to present times, and paints an unforgettable picture of a changing world and of working class people whose only riches are love and the knowledge that they did their best. - from publisher's website