Summer 1966: When her father comes home with lipstick on his collar, ten-year-old Claire's life is turned upside down. Her mother heads to London, and Claire and her brothers are packed off to Ireland, to their reclusive grandmother on the beautifully bleak coast of Connemara. Claire finds it hard to make friends until she happens across a boy her own age from the school next door. He lives at the local orphanage, a notoriously harsh place. Amidst half-truths, lies and haunting family secrets, Claire forms a forbidden friendship with Emmet - a bond that will change both their lives forever.