Evelyn Hood

In 1913 Kirsty Lennox's children have high hopes for the future, but as the Great War looms the whole family is forced to face harsh realities.

Although it is wartime, life has to go on for the residents of the tenement block in Glen Street, Paisley. During the day Chloe McCosh works at Cochran's emporium, but the evenings are the best time. Then she can watch the dance band run by her parents, and her special interest is the young trumpeter, Dennis Megson.

Scotland 1912 and a year after the death of Weem Lowrie his family are still coming to terms with the lives he shaped for them. Elder son James is denied his wish to skipper the family ship, whilst younger son Innes is still finding his sea legs and daughter Bethany has to deal with a marriage forced on her by Weem.

Sequel to 'The Shimmer Of The Herring' (6190). After the death of her husband, Bethany Pate assumes that she will have control of their fish-curing business and be independent. To her horror she learns that her husband has left everything, including Bethany, to his brother, Nathan Pate.

During WWII Mollie McCabe, her mother, her sister Senga, and her brothers stayed on the Isle of Bute at Westervoe Farm. When the war was over their brutal, bullying father came to take them home, but most of the McCabes did not wish to swap the countryside for the city so only Senga returned with him to Glasgow.