Iris and Lily are the lovably ingenuous youngest daughters in a family of fourteen, starving for attention as they struggle to survive in the chaotic, Catholic Capotosti household including, their hot-blooded father; Carlo. their submissiveness, overwhelmed mother Betty, and their half a dozen domineering brothers. Adding that to the inaccessible older sisters makes the home a minefield of emotional pitfalls for the two neglected, exuberant girls. As Iris and Lily scrape their way through puberty to adolescence, outside forces begin driving a wedge between them. Growing up during the eruption of the women's movement of the '70s and desperate for love, Iris and Lily naively take refuge in marriages that push them worlds apart, altering their relationship as sisters dramatically. Told in alternating chapters in the voices of the two protagonists, sprinkled with episodes of comedy and tragedy this is the story of every woman who has memories of what it is like to be a little girl, then a young woman on the cusp of adulthood, filled with hope and expectations