Since their mother’s death, siblings Imran, Sumaya and Majid have drifted in three very different directions, trying to live up to the last promises they each made to her. But when a viral news piece throws an unwanted spotlight on the family, they’re drawn back into each other’s lives for the first time in years.

Fiona and Violet Seng were just children when their family’s Cessna crash-landed in the Washington wilderness, claiming the lives of their parents. For twelve harrowing weeks, the girls fended for themselves before being rescued. Twenty-five years later, they’re still trying to move on from the trauma. Fiona repurposes it into controversial works of art. Violet has battled addiction and failed relationships to finally progress toward normalcy as a writer. The estranged sisters never speak about what they call their Alone Time in the wild.

Eighteen years ago, teenage Amy fled England, pregnant and heartbroken, to start over in New Zealand with her parents. Now Chris, the love she left behind, has walked into her beloved café by the beach and thrown her life into turmoil. As far as Amy’s concerned, Chris chose to ignore the child she was carrying when they last met. She brought up their daughter alone and created a happy home for them both on the other side of the world. But with Chris suddenly back in her life, she can no longer ignore the past and begins to wonder what really happened all those years ago.

Out there is chaos, the collapse of society, and so much to be afraid of. All that matters is freedom. That’s what Remy Blake has been taught by his survivalist father. Raised off the grid in the middle of nowhere, his own survival skills not yet honed, Remy is days shy of his eighth birthday when his father unexpectedly dies. As seasons pass, supplies run out, and fending for himself grows more desperate, Remy sets out on foot, unprepared for the great unknown of civilization.

At twenty-one years old, Gia Kumari finally leaves the Delhi orphanage where she was raised. With few prospects for the future, she receives an unexpected invitation from a stranger named Sonia Shah in San Francisco: an internship at Sonia’s weddings and events company. Gia and America. It’s love at first sight as she navigates an unfamiliar but irresistible new world of firsts.

Spring 1986, Oxford. Rachel has landed on her feet: engaged to handsome author Jonny, soon to be stepmother to his young daughter Teddy, and with a dream to open her own art gallery. It’s everything she wished for during her unsettled childhood. So when she meets candid and carefree American artist Gabe at a party and feels a familiar spark, she knows she needs to resist. But as her perfect life moves forward, Gabe is never far away, and there’s no denying the lure of the spontaneous, wildly adventurous existence he seems to offer.

Melody spends her days combing the shore for items washed up on her beach. She collects them in her basket and takes them back to Spindrift, her weathered little bungalow overlooking the sea, and weaves stories about her treasures. Everything Melody thinks she could ever need is right where she is, cupped by the rocks that shape her bay. But Melody has been keeping a secret.

Dawoud is on the run from his murky past, aiming to discover where he belongs. He tries to assimilate into different groups along his journey through North Africa and Israel, changing his clothes, his religious affiliations, and even his name to fit in, but the safety and peace he seeks remain elusive. It seems prejudice is everywhere, holding him back, when all he really wants is to create a simple life he can call his own. A chameleon, Dawoud—or David, Adal, or Dawit, depending on where and when you meet him—is not lost in this whirl of identities. In fact, he is defined by it. 

Lena Sharma is a successful San Francisco restaurateur. An immigrant, she’s cultivated an image of conservatism and tradition in her close-knit Indian community. But when Lena’s carefully constructed world begins to crumble, her ties to her daughter, Maya, and son, Sameer - both raised in thoroughly modern California - slip further away. 

Romy Moore has always cherished the warm embrace of her family home in the foothills of the Dublin Mountains - a welcome escape from life on the lower rungs of the London career ladder. It is her mother Cathy’s encouragement that has kept Romy chasing her dreams, so when she loses her, Romy feels more adrift than ever.

Home has always been a temporary arrangement for Samara Mansingh, a wayfaring wedding photographer and the daughter of a diplomat. When her father is uprooted once again, Samara needs a place to stay in Delhi. Next stop: the Khanna family. Samara’s memories of the Khannas are vague at best, but she doesn’t remember their home feeling so much like a war zone. And the last thing their surly eldest son, Sharav, wants is a houseguest eavesdropping on the chaos.

Four years into her marriage, Jenna is blindsided when her husband asks for a divorce. With time on her hands and her life in flux, she agrees to accompany her eccentric grandmother Evelyn on a road trip to the seaside Massachusetts town where much of their family history was shaped. When they hit the road, Evelyn spins the tale of the star-crossed teenage romance that captured her heart more than seventy years ago and changed the course of her life.

Pidgeon Pagonis always felt like their life was a constant attempt to fit in with other girls—a feeling that was only exacerbated when puberty failed to hit. They never understood why…until they uncovered the secret that had haunted their childhood.

Ruth’s childhood was a happy one, and her family—on her mother’s side—large and loving. But her father’s French origins have always remained a mystery. Now, with aged relatives beginning to die, Ruth decides to research her father’s family before it’s too late. When she discovers a series of long-lost cassettes, everything she thought she knew about them shatters. The tapes expose an unimaginable truth–an epic wartime story of hidden love and sacrifice, stretching back to occupied France.

Mabel Beaumont’s husband Arthur loved lists. He’d leave them for her everywhere. ‘Remember: eggs, butter, sugar’. ‘I love you: today, tomorrow, always’. But now Arthur is gone. He died: softly, gently, not making a fuss. But he’s still left her a list. This one has just one item on it though: ‘Find D’. Mabel feels sure she knows what it means. She must track down her best friend Dot, who she hasn’t seen since the fateful day she left more than sixty years ago.