After Romania enters the war on the side of the Axis, the Pringles rush from Bucharest to Greece as part of a group of refugees consisting of high-ranking officials, White Russian émigrés, journalists and fraudsters. However, in Athens the couple will have to face a new challenge, no less severe than the war spreading across Europe. Olivia Manning's subtle observations about love, marriage and friendship in the midst of historical catastrophe add up to a panorama of the dramatic circumstances of a damaged life and a living testimony to an era.