Four women from Haiti, St. Thomas, and Guam meet at a college counseling session for first-year students and learn they have a shared history of abuse. Dubbing themselves the "island sisters," their unyielding friendship is their touchstone across oceans, through labyrinths of forced marriages, violent men, motherhood, and their dreams of freedom. To succeed, each woman must make choices that will challenge her long-held cultural beliefs, choices that will come with consequences, in the pursuit of her own individual freedom.