For Tom, a counsellor struggling to rebuild his emotional life after the breakdown of his marriage, the suburbs are his world. His neighbours in Winter Close are his 'people', a kind of twenty-first century tribe. Tom, however, has a weakness for jumping to dramatic conclusions about his neighbours' relationships with each other and with him. Although he's often wrong, the truth is even more engrossing than his fantasies.

When a freak storm hits Winter Close, more is destroyed than trees and houses. Personal façades are demolished as well, exposing tensions and releasing repressed emotions that draw Tom and all his neighbours into a painful series of confrontations and reassessments.