Jo Devereux returns to Ireland for her mother's funeral with some trepidation as she left home without telling the family where she was going some twenty years before and hasn't been back since. One of her mother's dying wishes was that Jo should write the family history using a suitcase full of family papers as research material. Pregnant as the result of a one-night stand, Jo decides to stay on in Ireland rather than return to her home in San Francisco. The story is not just about what Jo discovers of her family history, but what she finds out about herself and those closest to her.