'Lilac Street was a crowded, sooty-faced, workaday place, the houses full and the streets teeming with children. One thing it was, without a doubt, was full of life.'

Birmingham, almost a decade after the end of the Great War, and the women of Lilac Street have had more than their fair share of troubles . . .

Rose Southgate is trapped, bringing up her daughter in a loveless marriage. Shy and isolated, she tries to make the best of her life, until she meets a man who changes everything.

Jen Green is desperately struggling to make ends meet, with a sick husband, and five children to support. Aggie, her eldest daughter, is twelve years old and longs for excitement. But she finds that prying into the adult world shows her more than she had bargained for.

And Phyllis Taylor is a widow who has managed to put a dark and traumatic past behind her. The return of Phyllis' daughter Dolly, harbouring a secret of her own, threatens to overturn the life Phyllis has built and reveal everything she has fought to hide for so long.

These women, along with their neighbours, find strength in friendship, as they discover that the best way to solve their problems is to face them together.