In the 1870s two remarkable women meet in a remote country town in Western Australia. Ingrid is a botanist, fiercely independent and travelling alone as she collects botanical specimens. Hundreds of miles from home, she tries to distance herself from a broken heart after her lover was forced to marry. Ingrid puts her own troubles aside on meeting Ellyn, a young woman living in stark isolation and driven close to madness by the death of her baby daughter. Ellyn's husband is away indefinitely, and she's had no word from him while the small community has turned its back on her because of her "unseemly" grieving. When the two women meet they forge a bond that grows ever deeper. But can their intimacy find acceptance in their conventional world?' - back cover