David Lurie, a middle-aged divorcee lecturing at the Technical University of Cape Town, has an impulsive affair with a student. When the passion sours and he is denounced, he resigns and retreats to his daughter Lucy's isolated smallholding. For a time, he finds calm in the routine of farm life, but the balance of power in the country is shifting. When he and Lucy become victims of a savage and disturbing attack, all the faultlines in their relationship are revealed.