Chrissie Beveridge

新聞コラムニストのベンジャミンは、半年前の妻の死を引きずり、14歳の息子ディランや7歳の娘ロージーの教育にも悩む。新聞社を辞めたベンジャミンは、父の遺産を使って新居で人生を再出発させようと考える。郊外の広い家を気に入るが、そこを買うには同じ敷地にあって2年も閉園状態の動物園や飼育員たちも引き取るのが条件。ベンジャミンは意を決して引っ越し、動物園の経営に乗り出すが、意外な出費などのトラブルが続く。

During the 1940s, a group of young men go off to war, leaving behind Ethel Ann, who is in love with one of them, Teddy. In modern-day Belfast, a man named Jimmy endeavors to return a ring found in the wreckage of a crashed plane. He travels to Michigan, where the grown Ethel Ann, who married another man after Teddy was killed in battle, now lives. Ethel Ann must decide whether to go with Jimmy to meet the soldier who last saw Teddy alive.

Parallel stories: 18th century Harrison builds the marine chronometer for safe navigation at sea; 20th century Gould is obsessed with restoring it.