Five families are brought together through the world-shaking dramas of the First World War, the Russian Revolution and the struggle for votes for women.It is 1911, and the coronation day of King George V. Thirteen-year-old Billy Williams begins his first day at work in a coal mine.The Williams family is connected by romance and enmity to the Fitzherberts, aristocratic coal-mine owners. Lady Maud Fitzherbert falls in love with Walter von Ulrich, a spy at the German embassy in London. Their destiny is entangled with that of Gus Dewar, ambitious young aide to U.S. President Woodrow Wilson. Two orphaned Russian brothers soon become involved, but Grigori and lev Peshkov's plan to emigrate to America falls foul of war, conscription and revolution