The novel opens in occupied Korea during the war, and the family is ripped apart by their resistance to Japanese rule. When the war is over in 1945, shortly after the start of the novel, the Japanese leave. It should be a happy time for them (and Korea) but they wind up in the section that the Russians control and still separated. They try to escape, as many did, but wind up wandering. They are finally reunited, but just before the Korean War breaks out in 1949.
