Set on a farm in the Eastern Cape, and taking place over one day, the novel is a wrought meditation on motherhood and our destructive relationship to the Earth. A former geneticist, Kate is now an award-winning maker of organic cheese. She relies on the farm's routine to hold steady as her day teeters on a knife's edge: her estranged daughter is in London, waiting for her conjoined twins to survive surgery, while keeping her own mother away. Meanwhile, Kate's employee Nosisi's son is undergoing initiation. Forbidden to have contact with him during this traditional passage into the world of manhood, she anxiously awaits his return.