In the last year of the nineteenth century in the village of Chevalier in southern India. Solomon Dorai, the headman, is desperately trying to hold together the fraying ends of village life at a time of huge social and political unease. When violence finally erupts it take Solomen and the traditional structure of the village with it. Three generation of come and go in the village by sea, winning and losing the battle for chevarthar. There are soloman’s sons; the studious denial, both exiled by their father’s death but in different ways, both determined to make their mark on the world. And there is Danial ’s son Kannan, faced with a set of challenges that could break him if he isn’t strong enough...