Two years after writing the memoir of Judge Sara Hastings, 31-year-old Diane Montgomery finds herself at a crossroads. In the quiet solitude of her Kitty Hawk beach house, she contemplates the decisions that have brought her here: the choice to abandon her career in journalism to write a novel, the decision to move her and her daughter halfway across the state, and the ultimate decision - moving on from the loss of her husband. But when she meets Nathan Garner, a 37-year-old artist who has recently opened a gallery near the beach, she is taken aback by the stirring of something familiar in her heart. Something that whispers of second chances and sunlit futures. That is, until Sara Hastings passes away, leaving Diane to grapple with a grief that is both new and hauntingly reminiscent of the past. Can Diane gather the fragments of her heart and put them back together, or will she allow herself to be consumed by the tide of sorrow?