The Cartographer
of Lost Things.
A widow in 1912 Lisbon inherits her father's map shop, a stranger's letter, and a choice between the life she was told to want and the one she almost chose at nineteen. From the Booker-longlisted author of Salt & Latitude.
Pick · Feb '26
A love story
drawn in ink.
Lisbon, 1912. Ines Mendes is twenty-nine, four years a widow, and has just buried her father in the Cemitério dos Prazeres.
In the backroom of his map shop on Rua Garrett she finds a wooden drawer she was never meant to open: forty-one letters, addressed but never sent, to a man named Tomás Vieira — a cartographer who left Portugal in 1898 for the island of São Tomé and never came back.
The first letter is dated the week before Ines's wedding. The last is dated three days before her father died.
The Cartographer of Lost Things is a novel about the maps we draw for other people and the ones we finally dare to draw for ourselves. It is quiet, ferocious, and ends with a decision you will argue about for a week.
"We spend our whole lives learning which streets to walk down, and our whole lives again unlearning them."
— from Chapter SevenSeven chapters,
freely yours.
Read the opening of the novel before you buy. PDF, ePub, and a quiet Tuesday-morning essay from Margaret every other week.
The Drawer
Ines, the afternoon of the funeral, finds the forty-one letters in her father's map shop.
Rua Garrett, 1898
A flashback to the week Tomás left Lisbon, told from her father's point of view.
The Bride Who Almost Didn't
Ines at nineteen, three days before her wedding to a man she does not love.
Compass Rose
The first letter. Tomás writing from Funchal, still within reach.
São Tomé
Fourteen years of letters, summarised as a map of a single human life.
The Reply
Ines writes back for the first time. We do not see what she says yet.
Read the Decision
Get chapters 1 through 7 in your inbox, then chapter 8 the morning the book releases.
What other
writers are saying.
"Holloway writes the way a tide comes in — slowly, then all at once. The final fifty pages of this book arrived on my chest like weather."
Clara Ayodeleauthor of Bright Unusual, Booker shortlist 2024"A map of a marriage, a map of an era, a map of a life the heroine did not live. I finished it in one Sunday and sat in the garden afterwards for an hour."
Jonah Kiefferauthor of The Swimmer at Menton, NBCC Finalist"I argued with my wife about the last page for four days. That is the highest praise I know how to give a novel."
Rafael KowalczykLiterary Editor, Granta
Margaret Holloway.
Margaret Holloway was born in Edinburgh in 1974 and lived for nine years in Lisbon before returning to the Scottish Borders, where she writes most mornings in a converted stone byre. Her first novel, Salt & Latitude, was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2019. Her second, A Year of Small Weathers, won the Walter Scott Prize in 2023.
The Cartographer of Lost Things is her third novel. She is represented by Harriet Okonkwo at Curtis Brown and her essays appear in Granta, The Paris Review, and Literary Hub. She writes a fortnightly letter for readers at margaretholloway.com.
Honest answers.
When does the book come out?
February 4, 2026 in the UK and US (Harper Literary, hardcover and ebook). French translation (Éditions de l'Olivier) follows September 2026, Portuguese (Relógio d'Água) in March 2027.
Where should I pre-order?
Wherever you like. Your local indie bookshop helps Margaret most — Waterstones, Bookshop.org, Libreria Bertrand in Portugal, or Books Are Magic and Powell's in the US all carry it. Signed first-editions are available from Topping & Company until Jan 20.
Is there an audiobook?
Yes. Read by Olivia Colman, 11 hours 20 minutes. Available same day on Libro.fm, Audible, and Apple Books.
Will you visit my book club?
Margaret joins four book clubs a month over Zoom, chosen by lottery from sign-ups. A reader's guide with 18 discussion questions will be sent with your pre-order receipt.
What's the newsletter?
A quiet Tuesday-morning letter from Margaret every other week. Long-form, a photograph, one reading recommendation, never a launch promotion. 9,400 readers.
Pre-order
The Cartographer of Lost Things.
Hardcover · 384 pages · Harper Literary · February 4, 2026.
◆ Or read Chapter One free — delivered to your inbox this evening.