When Patience St. Clare falls in love for the first time, everyone seems out to destroy her happiness. While her social-climbing mother plots to marry her off to a man she doesn't love, Patience devises a plan of her own. Determined to escape the confines of strict Victorian society, Patience sets her plan in motion. When things go tragically and horribly wrong, scandal ensues and Patience must learn to live in world where forgiveness is always just out of reach, and where redemption seems an impossible dream.