Sydney, present day: Bailey Knight, a writer, post-divorce is starting over, returning to the city in which she feels most at home. While looking for her next story, her deep appreciation and curiosity of the women who came before her draws her to investigate the previous inhabitants of her terrace home in Paddington—specifically, a mother and daughter. Bailey dives deep into the tragic end of Ada Lakeford, whose murdered image was preserved in a painting: To a Better Place, also locally referred to as — The Girl in the Green Dress or The Slasher Girl.

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Sydney, 1930: Matilda Lakeford, an aspiring journalist waiting for her opportunity to write real stories, is visited by a lawyer who gives her possessions she has inherited from a man she does not know. One item in particular stops her in her tracks, a painting of her mother. Matilda asks her grandfather to tell her the truth about her mother’s death, but he can only share the heartbreaking details he knows. And so, Tilly, on her quest to learn her mother’s story, has to navigate through the slums of Surry Hills, Kings Cross, Woolloomooloo, and Darlinghurst - rife with prostitution, people drunk off sly-grog and pinkie, and the notorious dappers, armed with their razors offering their infamous Darlinghurst smile.

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L. M. Robin captures both ends of a story; one that lived it, and the other that wrote it. The compelling depictions of time, place, and culture offer a window into Sydney, 1930. The Space in Between explores how one choice affects not only ourselves but also those caught in its larger web.