A Russian woman named Lara arrives in Afghanistan at the house of Marcus Caldwell, an Englishman and widower living in the shadow of the Tora Bora mountains. Marcus` daughter, Zameen, may have known Lara`s brother, a Soviet soldier who disappeared in the area many years previously. But like Marcus` wife, Zameen is dead; a victim of the age in which she was born. In the days that follow, further people arrive at the house: two Americans who have spent much of their adult lives in the area; a young Afghan teacher; and a radicalized young man intent on his own path. And Nadeem Aslam paints a moving, beautiful and powerful portrait of a land and a people torn apart through love and war.