In a period sometime after graduation from an unknown Ivy, which he may or may not have attended, Kip Alistair Darling sets out to discover a world outside of his own. After waking day after day in random pool houses around New England and vacant apartments in New York, Kip Darling heads to Istanbul to find himself. Narrowly escaping death, Kip and his companion, Hunter, flee across Southern Europe by train and board a ship bound for a world cruise. In Beirut, Kip and Hunter take up residence and befriend two young Lebanese boys as the chaos in Syria starts to spill over into Lebanon. Taking refuge at a compound in Tripoli, Kip and Hunter plan a trip to Damascus. A harrowing journey by car across the Lebanese-Syrian border leads them to a city under siege that has been calmed only recently by a UN brokered cease-fire. Before Kip and his companions can leave however, the powder keg explodes and Kips experiences first hand the brutality of a civil war that he is powerless to control.