Zoe, a professional childcare worker, and single mother to Hari, four, who has selective mutism, is sinking beneath the waves trying to cope by herself in London. Then her ex-sister-in-law suggests she move to Scotland to help run a bookshop. There her path crosses that of Ramsay Urquart, a widower and antiquarian bookseller, who has a band of difficult children he can't manage. Can two very damaged people help heal each other?