From midtown Manhattan to a Florida suburb, from coastal Savannah to the hills of Rome, the interwoven tales of three women unfold in the voices of Sarah, Miriam, and Beth. Their unshakable friendship takes root in a Buffalo college dorm in the late 1960s. Fueled by the optimism and bravado of that era, they charge into adulthood with high expectations and lofty ideas. They were, as Beth would later observe, "the first generation of women to feel entitled to interesting lives."

In the decades that follow, they come to terms with a disconcerting postscript to the Age of Aquarius: Life--inevitably, unsparingly, repeatedly--demands compromise. And, in the year leading up to 9/11, all three women face obstacles on the paths they have long followed and are forced to face hard truths about themselves. With emotional courage and wry humor, and sustained by their abiding friendship, they move to dispel past regrets and make peace with present circumstances as they move towards the second acts of their lives.