When Chloe Murray's mother disappears from Wahmurra, Australia, the police and her family search everywhere. Nobody thinks of looking in the past. Four years later, Chloe herself is catapulted back to 1833 and hears stories about Lady Peter Kendricks. While she waits to meet the mysterious Lady Peter, Chloe makes friends with Thad Compton, a young convict. Life in 1833 is surprisingly hectic. Someone wants to kill her. Thad is always a hairsbreadth away from being flogged, and death is always close. Eventually she must choose between love and friendship in 1833 and her other life with her dad and grandmother with all the advantages of the twenty-first century.