Single mother and immigrant Sonia Diaconescu works at a sheltered accommodation scheme. A resident of the scheme has made an official complaint against her, rousing the elderly community into a mob of angry and fearful citizens whose intolerance is palpable.
Set in a Yorkshire milltown in 1957, Ellen Hardy is unhappily married but is close to her ten-year-old son, Victor. The family has recently moved house and Victor has started at a new school where Ellen has become friendly with his teacher, Kathy Thompson, who is keen to encourage him at art. As the friendship between the two women grows, Ellen's millworker husband, Hardy, feels increasingly alienated at home.
