Sade's mother is shot outside their Lagos home by assassins targeting her journalist father Folarin.

Uncle Tunde secretly obtains fake passports for Sade and Femi so they can flee Nigeria without their father.

Sade and Femi hide under a blanket in a car to slip through police roadblocks on the way to the airport.

Sade and Femi board a plane to London posing as the children of their escort, Mrs. Bankole.

Mrs. Bankole abandons Sade and Femi at Victoria Station, where Uncle Dele is nowhere to be found.

London police take Sade and Femi to the station after finding them inside a vandalized video shop.

Social worker Robert places Sade and Femi with emergency foster mother Mrs. Graham.

Sade gives social worker Jenny a false surname and a false hometown to protect her father in Nigeria.

Sade and Femi are fingerprinted at the Immigration and Nationality Department during their asylum application.

Sade and Femi are placed with Auntie Gracie and Uncle Roy King, a warm Jamaican couple with West African roots.

Mama Appiah reveals that Folarin traveled to England on a fake passport to find his children and has been detained.

Sade and Femi travel alone at night to a TV news station and convince a journalist to report their father's story.

A television news report about Folarin airs, describing him as an outspoken Nigerian journalist and generating widespread public attention.

Folarin arrives unexpectedly at the Kings' home on Christmas Eve, having been released from the detention center.

Folarin gives Sade her Iyawo and Oko figurines, and the three family members embrace alone together for the first time since Mama's death.

After Sade's mother is shot by assassins targeting her journalist father Folarin, Sade and Femi are hurried onto a plane to London with a stranger named Mrs. Bankole. When Mrs. Bankole abandons them at Victoria Station, the children navigate London alone until they enter the foster care system and are eventually placed with the warm and supportive King family. While in exile, Sade works to protect her brother at school and keeps her real identity hidden from authorities out of fear for her father's safety back in Nigeria. The siblings discover that Folarin has also made it to England but is being detained, and they maintain their bond through visits and letters while his legal team fights for asylum. Determined to help, the children secretly travel to a television news station and convince a journalist to broadcast Folarin's story, generating the public attention needed to protect him from deportation. The family is finally reunited on Christmas Eve when Folarin is released from detention and arrives at the Kings' home, returning Sade's treasured figurines as a symbol of home reclaimed.

The Solaja children's desperate journey from Lagos to London and their fight to reunite with their father.

Uncle Tunde questions whether Folarin's bravery is matched by wisdom after Mama is killed and the danger becomes clear.

Mama Buke helps Sade and Femi pack to leave Nigeria; Sade must leave her cherished Iyawo and Oko statues behind.

Sade watches Mrs. Bankole slip money to a Nigerian airport official to pass through security.

On the overnight flight to London, Sade realizes the last real meal she ate was cooked by her mother.

Sade and Femi go to Uncle Dele's college in London but are told no one has seen him in a long time.

Teacher Miss Harcourt introduces Sade to Mariam, a fellow African exile from Somalia, at Avon School.

Marcia seizes Sade's completed homework, crumples it, and tells her she is no one in front of other students.

Mariam confides in Sade, sharing her family's devastating story of fleeing war in Somalia and living in a Kenyan refugee camp.

Sade and Femi visit their father at the Heathlands Detention Center for the first time.

Sade and Folarin exchange letters in which Folarin reassures Sade that her difficult decisions to keep secrets were understandable.

The Nigerian government formally accuses Folarin of murdering his wife in order to pressure Britain into deporting him.

Uncle Dele appears at Heathlands, revealing he had been in hiding and was drawn out by the television news report about Folarin.

Folarin tells his children he plans to go on a hunger strike to draw attention to his detention case.

A parent's complaint leads to Marcia and Donna getting into serious trouble and leaving school early, never returning that day.

Sade writes a Christmas letter to her grandmother in Nigeria, maintaining her bond with the family she left behind.

From the moment Uncle Tunde questions whether Folarin's courage is matched by wisdom, the novel traces the ripple effects of Folarin's choices on everyone around him. Sade and Femi leave behind everything familiar—including Sade's treasured Iyawo statue—as they make their way through an unfamiliar London, failing to find Uncle Dele at his college. At Avon School, Sade forms a fragile friendship with Somali refugee Mariam while enduring the cruelty of bullies Marcia and Donna, who attack her African heritage and destroy her schoolwork. After the children locate their father at the Heathlands Detention Center, visits and letters allow Folarin to stay involved in his children's lives, reassure Sade about her choices, and plan his defense—including a hunger strike. The news broadcast draws Uncle Dele out of hiding and pressures the British government, while Marcia and Donna finally face consequences for their bullying. Sade closes the story by writing to her grandmother in Nigeria, honoring the extended family bonds that sustain her even across the distance of exile.

The supporting events and relationships that shaped Sade and Femi's experience in exile.

Sade answers the phone and receives a threatening message for her father warning that the family could be targeted next.

Folarin tells Sade and Femi they must leave for London immediately without him for their own safety.

Femi urges Sade to run away at the airport rather than board the plane, but Sade talks him out of it.

Sade wakes from a nightmare in which she relives her mother being shot, disturbing the other children at Mrs. Graham's home.

Social worker Jenny mentions Ken Saro-Wiwa, and Sade recalls her mother pleading with Folarin to be careful after the execution.

Mrs. Appiah from the Refugee Council tells the children to call her Mama, offering a rare moment of cultural familiarity.

Marcia and Donna tell Sade she must steal from Mariam's uncle's shop or they will target Femi at his school.

Despite knowing it will betray her closest friend, Sade steals a lighter from Mariam's uncle's store to protect Femi.

Sade speaks with her father on the phone for the first time since leaving Nigeria, learning he is in detention.

Folarin sends his children a letter retelling the folktale of the tortoise and tiger to remind them that words are mightier than swords.

Sade apologizes to Mariam for the theft and discovers that Marcia had also coerced Mariam into stealing from the store.

Sade collapses at school and is taken to the nurse's office after suppressing her grief and guilt for too long.

Alone in her room, Sade breaks down and confronts her long-buried belief that she is responsible for her mother's death.

Femi fetches Sade to watch a television broadcast showing both children on screen as proof they are alive in England.

Kevin, who had previously been unkind to the children, asks Sade to tell Femi he can join him for football.

The novel's emotional core lies in the decisions Sade is forced to make alone and the revelations that test her sense of identity and loyalty to her family's values. From receiving a threatening phone call intended for her father to talking Femi out of running away at the airport, Sade shoulders enormous responsibility from the very first pages of the story. In London, she faces an impossible dilemma when Marcia coerces her into stealing from Mariam's family shop to protect Femi, a choice that fills Sade with shame and nearly destroys her most important friendship. The discovery that her father is alive in England brings relief, but Sade continues to suffer in silence, eventually collapsing at school and finally confronting her long-suppressed guilt over her mother's death. Unexpected moments of grace—Mariam's forgiveness, Femi stepping up to fill in details for the journalist, and Kevin's surprising invitation to Femi—signal that healing and connection are possible even in exile. Sade's arc concludes not with neat resolution but with tentative hope, as she begins to understand that wisdom sometimes means holding competing values in tension rather than resolving them perfectly.

The key decisions, emotional revelations, and turning points that define Sade's coming-of-age journey.