In love, there's no such thing as a coincidence ...Scottsville, Arizona, 1989In small-town America, Joy Sheldon loves the plants that bloom in the desert but longs too for the sea's elemental wildness. It's a dream never realised – and now, facing the brutal truth that her husband is a cheat, Joy learns of unimaginable secrets in her early life. Riven by betrayal and loss, a chance encounter with the enigmatic Lewis, Joy embarks on a journey to seek her true identity – and to discover why the sea pulls so strongly at her heart.Soho, London, 1967Lewis Bell, abandoned by his mother and responsible for his wayward sister, is now living the dream. An ambitious young graphic designer, he's aiming for the big time – if only he can keep his creative spark. His talented girlfriend Marnie adds pressures of her own and, as Lewis's troubles intensify, sixties London fast shows its darker...

Nicholas is running away, both from his marriage and an unfaithful wife, and the comfortable life he has known in Dublin. He buys a run down house in rural Cavan, right in the heart of Ireland, and embarks on a huge renovation project. While he is there, the house seems to speak to him - there are voices coming from an untraceable source, the seductive smell of baking seeps through the walls, and there is the unmistakable ethereal presence of a woman from the past. She is June Fanning, an English woman who lived in the house in 1941. As her narrative combines with Nicholas's, the story of The Adulteress is revealed - and Nicholas begins to discover exactly what went wrong with his own marriage.

Christina's mother walked out on her when she was just six years old. Now in her early thirties, Christina has reached a desperate crossroads as a mother herself and goes on the run with her youngest in a bid to find her mother, Greta, and sanctuary from her husband and family. At times challenged and inspired by her new alien environment, Christina returns to memories of her childhood, growing up on the river in Co. Meath, Ireland, and her relationship with her stepmother, Angeline, who was once her mother's best friend. Christina begins to acknowledge the shameful reason behind her own failed motherhood and discovers a dark secret her family has never revealed.

Eithne is the keeper of secrets in her family: when her sister Beatrice disappeared from her home in the dark woods of Co. Meath, it was 13-year-old Eithne who uncovered the forlorn evidence of her life: a string of pearls, a scarf, a pink beret, a compact and her beloved sketchbook. Their mother, Sarah, was so grief-stricken that she did not speak for six years, and her father, Joe, sank further into drink-filled rage. Now, as an adult, Eithne is an artist, and tries to remember her sister in her prints of the dark wooded bogs behind her house: 'I print my landscapes, but they are no longer just that. Objects enter their arenas, all hidden in the woods- by the lough, under the Aspen trees- a string of pearls, a compact, a hat, a sketchbook...' For there was something else about Beatrice that was rarely spoken in the household, a dark, guilty secret that her disappearance only made worse. Something about Beatrice's birth and an Englishman, covered forever by Sarah's shame and...