Lovers and strangers: an immigrant history of post-war Britain

The battered and exhausted Britain of 1945 was desperate for workers - to rebuild, to fill the factories, to make the new NHS work.

From all over the world and with many motives, thousands of individuals took the plunge.

Most assumed they would spend just three or four years here, sending most of their pay back home, but instead large numbers stayed - and transformed the country.

Drawing on an amazing array of unusual and surprising sources, Clair Wills' book brings to life the incredible diversity and strangeness of the migrant experience.

She introduces us to lovers, scroungers, dancers, homeowners, teachers, drinkers, carers, and many more to show the opportunities and excitement as much as the humiliation and poverty that could be part of the new arrivals' experience.