Following the death of his parents, eleven-year-old Alex Dove leaves his life on a farm in Tasmania for school in England. Twelve years on, he must return to Australia to deal with his inheritance. But his encounter with a young woman persuades him to stay. They marry, and he finds himself drawn into the dynamics of island life. Longing for children, they take a teenage castaway, whose presence begins to unravel their tenuously forged happiness, while at the same time offering the prospect of a much greater fulfilment...