Winner of the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize England is in a state of environmental and economic crisis. Under the repressive regime of The Authority, citizens have been herded into urban centres, and all women of child-bearing age fitted with contraceptive devices. A woman known as 'Sister' leaves her oppressive marriage to join an isolated group of women in a remote northern farm at Carhullan, where she intends to become a rebel fighter. But can she follow their notion of freedom and what it means to fight for it?