Bill Chambers has come home from the Second World War with several fingers of his right hand missing but with the will to restore his family life intact. He wants the best for his wife and children, and with his steady job at the hardware store the future stretches out before him. Yet as that future takes hold and the family members spread out into the larger world, generations pull apart and come together again, bonds deepen and widen, loyalties are tested by time and chance, and love creates its own snares. 283 pages.