Stephen Morris was always fascinated by Russia. As a child caught between his evangelical grandmother’s warnings on the evils of socialism and his father’s activism for nuclear disarmament, his ambiguous position was exemplified by a huge military map of the Soviet Union tacked to his bedroom wall.

In the dying days of the Soviet, he travels to Moscow and meets and marries a beautiful Russian. Although in London for a time, his wife and children return to live in rural Russia. Stephen does not go with them.

He later returns to take them on a trip through Russia, with the hope of reconnecting with his family and the country. Yet the country has changed, and so has his family. Adrift, he embarks on a lyrical journey that will him from the White Sea to the Black Sea.