Fay and Ellie Marlow are two sisters from Sandford, south of London, living with their parents; Rita and Gordon. As teenagers, they chase boys and double date, all fun and games until one day Fay’s life is irreversibly changed.

Fallen pregnant, she and the handsome Jeremy Page quickly marry and settle down. Not comfortably, as one night, Jeremy leaves the house and doesn’t return. For the next few years, the Marlow family struggle to keep together in the wake of death, life and loss.

Fay must hold it together for her daughter’s sake and Ellie tries to stay loyal to her family despite feeling betrayed once Fay remarries, while Gordon works to keep his family together. Living in the grand Sandford Lodge, the family quickly increases in size as time rolls on; Fay’s four daughters being raised in the house, just as she and Ellie were as girls. Twenty years after the first daughter, Laura, was born, an unexpected visitor returns looking to cause trouble and wreak havoc in the finally calm household.

With the lives of the six women in the family weaving in and out of each other, the romances and tragedies all come to a head, with results no one was expecting. While the relationships between sisters remain strong amongst the drama, it is the bonds between fathers and daughters that are the most tumultuous.