Zed and her family move unwillingly from London to a village in Cornwall, in an attempt to support her mother's mental health. Dad says they need a fresh start, but no one's asked Zed what she thinks. She knows she'll never fit into her new school, or make any friends, let alone find someone special. At this rate she'll be lucky to find a phone signal. Maybe their new home will help with Mum's depression, and keep Zed's sister Amy away from her dropout boyfriend, but why does it have to be so remote? Why has the boathouse been locked up for seventy years? Why do the birds living by the estuary fill her with such dread? And what do they WANT? Gradually the family fall apart, and it is only when Zed realises that the local cormorants are playing a part in the disasters that consume them, in revenge for an ancient wrong, that she and Amy start working together to find a solution and call a truce.