Matt Reddy's old Asiatic Fleet destroyer USS Walker has been mysteriously transported to an alternate version of earth. Here, WWII is no longer raging, and Reddy and his crew have been trying to find a new place for themselves in this strange new world. Now, along with the felinoid Lemurians and Imperial allies, they fight to keep the reptilian Grik, a race growing in supremacy, from reconquering the Lemurians' ancestral home on Madagascar. Reddy and his crew are exhausted, far from reinforcements, and wildly outnumbered.
Pressed into service when World War II breaks out in the Pacific, the USS Walker - a Great-War vintage 'four-stacker' destroyer - finds itself in full retreat from pursuit by Japanese battleships. Its captain, Lieutenant Commander Matthew Patrick Reddy, knows that he and his crew are in dire straits. In desperation, he heads Walker into a squall, hoping it will give them cover - and emerges somewhere else.
There are already three people in artist Imogen Cameron's marriage -- herself, her husband, Alex, and their son, Rufus -- and that's just the way she likes it. But all that's about to change! When the Camerons hit dire financial straits they are forced to move out of London and accept an offer from Eleanor Latimer of a rent-free cottage on her estate.
