Life is hard for Barbara Gallagher. The year is 1946 and, a pregnant seventeen-year-old, she finds herself spurned by the child's father and scorned by her own mother. Ignoring pleas for an abortion, her mother's attempts to hide the disgrace from their neighbours, and the temptation to have the baby adopted at Moortown's hostel for unmarried mothers, Barbara resolves to turn her life around. In her search for lodgings, her two-day-old baby in tow, she comes to the magnificent house of landlord James Devlin and his wife. Enchanted by mother and child, and haunted by memories of their own tragic parenthood, the benevolent couple do all they can to assist the young woman. The story of Barbara's life and her quest to find security, love and, ultimately, reconciliation, is one of kindness, humour and poignancy.