I was smitten when I read Natasha Pulley’s first book, ‘The Watchmaker of Filigree Street’ a year or two ago, and so when I saw that a second book was being sent out into the world I knew that I had to rush out and buy a copy.

I’m so glad that I did. It was a lovely mixture of the familiar from the first book and the completely different and utterly right for this book; and it was set in the same slightly fanciful but utterly natural past that I wished could have been but that I know probably wasn’t.

At this point I should explain that this isn’t a sequel or part of a series, that there is a character who appears in both books, but that this is a different story set at a different time in that same world.

Merrick Tremayne is a horticultural expert and battered veteran of the East India Company’s opium trade. He’s retired to his family’s diapidated Cornish home after sustaining a serious leg injury, and, much as he loves the place, he is desperately sorry that his days of adventure are probably behind him.

They’re not of course, but he doesn’t know that.

He spends his days in the gardens and the greenhouses; and he is happy there but he is concerned that the estate continues to decay and that his brother, Charles, is either unwilling or unable to do anything about it, He’s also concerned that there seem to be explosions in the trees, and that the heavy statue that his father brought back from his travels seems to change position when he isn’t looking.

Charles doesn’t believe a word of it, and is inclined to believe that he is afflicted with the mental illness that sent their mother in an asylum. He tells Merrick that carrying on as they are isn’t an option: he can take on a small country parsonage or he can follow in his mother’s footsteps.

Fortunately help is at hand.

Merrick’s old friend, Clement Markham — a fellow adventurer and a peer of the realm — arrived with a wonderful proposition. Quinine supplies in India are running low and the government urgently needs a man who can travel to Peru, take some cuttings from the country’s quinine-rich cinchona trees, and make sure that they get to the sub-continent safely.

He says that Tremayne is their man.

He protested that his leg wasn’t up to the trip; he suspected – correctly – that there was more to the trip than he was being told; he knew that others had tried do the same thing and lost their lives in the process; but he was intrigued and he remembered that his father had told him stories about his own travels to that part of the world, and hinted that there were more stories that he couldn’t tell.

He joined the expedition.

It took him Merrick and Clem into the uncharted depths of Peru, to the town of Bedlam, a place that was both real and fantastical. There were lamps made of glowing pollen, there were exploding trees, there were rock formations of pure glass, and there was a border made of salt and bone that is was fatal to cross.

The two men reacted quite differently to these things, to other remarkable things they encountered and to the people they met. It became clear that they had different destinies …

I was drawn into this story from the very beginning – I loved the way that the fictional Tremaynes were insinuated into the family history of the real Tremayne family that used to live at Heligan – but even if I hadn’t known that very real place, where the lost gardens are open to visitors, I still would have been captivated.

I loved the way that Natasha Pulley told her story, and the way she held me at Merrick’s side as he made his extraordinary journey. Quite often I found that it wasn’t difficult to work out what was going on a little before he did, but I didn’t mind that at all because it was lovely watching all of his responses as he learned more and more.

The world he travelled through was so well realised, and the Peruvian jungle and the town of Bedlam felt wonderfully real and alive. The imaginative elements worked well because they came out of the natural world and old traditions, and they spoke of what makes up human. I particularly liked that way that those things sat against practical concerns, particularly the importance of a good cup of coffee.

The plot is so well constructed; and I loved that so much of the early part of the story in Cornwall was related to what happened to Merrick – and what had happened to his father – in Peru. I worked out a lot of things but I definitely didn’t work out everything, and I loved the final resolution, back in Cornwall again.

You could read this book that asks questions about life and faith; or you simply enjoy a lovely journey through a world that is both real and fantastical.

I was too caught up in the wonder of what I was reading to ponder the serious questions, but I saw that they were there and they gave the story weight without ever weighing it down.

I was sorry to leave the world of this book, but I know that I will go back one day to revisit this story and – I hope – to read new ones.