In the fictional small Irish town of Knockglen in 1950, an unlikely friendship blossoms between ten-year-old Bernadette 'Benny' Hogan – an overweight, big-hearted, only child of a local merchant – and wiry orphan Eve Malone, raised from birth by nuns in a Catholic convent after her late mother's upper-class Protestant family rejected her.

There their loyalty to each other is tested by the introduction of more students to their circle, including rugby player Jack Foley and the beautiful and ambitious social climber, Nan Mahon.

[2][3] Benny surprises everyone by winning the heart of the handsome Jack, but things turn sour when Nan attempts to use Eve's family connections to her own advantage.

Forced to abandon his plan to marry into the business, the efficient but unpleasant Sean Walsh demands a partnership, but Eddie Hogan dies before the agreement is signed.

Benny reluctantly plans to honour the agreement; however, when she looks more closely at the business accounts, it reveals Sean may not be the model employee he seems.

There Binchy discovered that talking with boys was not as fearful as she had thought, and conveys that experience in her depiction of Benny and Jack becoming friends.

"[3]Binchy similarly counterpoints the commercial aspirations of long-time merchants in the town against the newfangled ideas of two young entrepreneurs.