Kay Lynn Brooke is a wife and mother in Berkeley, California, building a solid future with her husband and family. Then on December 7, 1941, the bombing of Pearl Harbor throws Kay Lynn's life, and the lives of everyone she knows and loves, into chaos.

Within weeks, Kay Lynn's dearest friend, Kimiko, is forcibly relocated with her family to an internment camp. Kay Lynn's brother, fortified with a youthful and patriotic spirit, ships out for the Pacific. Her husband enlists ahead of the draft and leaves home for basic training, while Kay Lynn's sister works for the war effort on the home front--and holds a secret that places her in a different kind of danger.

As Kay Lynn struggles to parent, keep the household together, and challenge the social mores of the time, she both finds and gives strength through her letters to Kimiko. Over the next few uncertain years, and longing for the safe and simple clarity of the past, Kay Lynn has no choice but to find her own place and purpose in a rapidly changing world.