Thirty-two year old Becca Rowan has come north from Boston with one thought in mind: to reclaim the daughter she gave up at birth. Sixteen long years earlier, Becca was a pregnant teen, and terribly frightened…until her family arranged a secret --- and not legal --- ‘adoption’ of her child by Becca’s brother David and his wife Naomi. Ever since then, Rain has considered her aunt and uncle her birth parents, and her birth mother, her beloved aunt. Since then, Becca’s been trying to prove to herself and to her family that she’s no longer the careless, irresponsible teen she once was. For sixteen long years she’s worked hard to achieve financial stability and career status, but at the cost of personal relationships.

Becca’s never been in a long-term romance and has pretty much given up on dating. In fact, the thought of one day marrying and having another child never even crosses her mind. But one thing has crossed her mind --- the idea of reclaiming her daughter. True, the family agreed that not until Rain was twenty-one would they discuss the possibility of revealing their long-held secret to the girl. But Becca is desperately lonely --- and tired of waiting. To her mind, life with her daughter is the solution to her own emptiness.

Needless to say, the other members of the Rowan family are not pleased.

Becca’s grandmother, Nora; her parents Steve and Julie; her brother David and his wife Naomi; her sister Olivia and her husband James; and her youngest sister, twenty-one year old Lily --- each reacts to Becca’s announcement in his or her own way, which, of course, reflects his or her own current situation in life. For example, Lily, fresh from a romantic betrayal, is dismayed to realize that life is so full of deceit, while Nora, in an effort to put to rest her own troubled past and doubts about her role in the ‘adoption’, shares with Lily a secret she’s never told anyone.

While the Rowans grapple with what most see as a looming disaster, Becca finds herself attracted to their neighbor, an artist and teacher. Simply by being himself, and not even knowing Becca’s secret, Alex Mason challenges her to think carefully about her life --- and to re-evaluate the prejudices she’s formed about her family. Becca can hardly admit to the feelings she’s beginning to feel when she’s with Alex... and to the changes being wrought within her regarding the family she’s come to view as the enemy.

On Christmas Eve, when the rest of the family is off at church, Becca shares an important conversation with Nora and then, late into the night, watching the bright stars twinkling in a black sky, she comes to a momentous decision about her future --- and the future of her daughter.

Traditions are questioned; loyalties are tested; familial bonds are tried --- and sometimes strengthened; and romance makes an unexpected but timely appearance in this novel of one life-changing week in December.