In the late 1930s, civil war gripped Spain. Roser, a pregnant young widow, finds her life irreversibly intertwined with an army doctor and the brother of her deceased love. In order to survive, the two must unite in a marriage neither of them wants, and together are sponsored by poet Pablo Neruda to embark on the SS Winnipeg along with 2,200 other refugees in search of a new life. An epic novel spanning decades and crossing continents.