While promoting her most recent movie, a film about adoption, India Allwood does something she knows you should never do --- she tells a journalist the truth.

THIS IS HOW IT ALWAYS IS is a novel about how it always is: Change is always hard and miraculous and hard again, parenting is always a leap into the unknown with crossed fingers and full hearts, children grow but not always according to plan…and families with secrets don’t get to keep them forever.

Sam Elling meets the love of his life, a coworker named Meredith. When Meredith's grandmother dies suddenly, Sam creates a computer program that will allow Meredith to have one last conversation with her grandmother. The idea catches on, but for every person who just wants to say good-bye, there is someone who can't let go.