Katherine Wells Sinclair remains at the family home, Hillside, in England, as she waits for her American husband to return from World War II. She teaches literature at a girls' school nearby. Her favorite student, Louise is orphaned and quits school to move to Glasgow to care for her brothers' children. She corresponds with Katherine during and after the war. Katherine becomes interested in gardens and their design while living at Hillside. She plans to create an English garden when she and her husband, John, move to Virginia after the war. In 1946, she travels to America on a war bride ship. The next year her daughter, Lizzie, is born, followed a year later by Peggy. Lizzie is a difficult child, self-centered, and mean to her sister. Katherine and John hire Louise to live with them, and help take care of the girls. Louise arrives in Virginia in 1949. She attends night school, and then enrolls at the local college, where she studies literature, and plans to teach. During the 1950 polio epidemic, John sends his family and Louise to England to spend the summer. This becomes a tradition. Lizzie and Peggy become close to the four cousins who live at Hillside. After several years of study, Katherine becomes a garden designer, and creates a memorial garden at the college. She designs a number of local gardens, as well. Lizzie wants to become an actress, and joins the children's theater group. She continues to taunt Peggy, who likes to read, play the piano, and work in her mother's garden. After two unsuccessful attempts in New York, Lizzie abandons her dream of a stage career, and marries a young man who is sent to Vietnam. Peggy becomes engaged to his friend, and they plan to marry when he returns from combat. During the next two years, the family endures heartbreak, loss and betrayal. Searching for a new beginning, they move to the ancestral home in England, and Peggy begins to fulfill her dream to restore the gardens at Hillside.