When eight-year-old Jill arrives in the USA in 1928 with her part-time mother, Mollie, she is already a seasoned traveler, but her prudishly Victorian attitude to body parts and functions instilled by a spinster aunt and reinforced by the nuns at boarding school is poor preparation for being sent to live with a male-dominated Jamaican family in Baltimore, where the intrusive behaviour of 'Uncle Percy' becomes a guilty secret.
In 1933, driven back to England by the Depression, mother and daughter live in London for six years before emigrating to Australia. During this time Jill becomes increasingly aware of Mollie's carelessness with the truth, but is not prepared for the extent of deception which is revealed after her death. Is Jill's supposedly dead father still alive? She sets off to discover the truth and eventually unearths the story of her conception and birth, acquiring, in the process, a congenial extended family with a fascinating history.
The author, Anne Tyler, in a personal note to Jill Rayner, praised the book's 'wry, intelligent, honest tone,' and encouraged her to consider publication.