Willa Knox and her family move into a rundown inherited house in Vineland, New Jersey, to save on housing costs.

A contractor tells Willa the deteriorating house must be completely demolished because it was built without a proper foundation.

Willa receives a call from her son Zeke reporting that his partner Helene has committed suicide after giving birth.

Thatcher Greenwood discovers that the house his wife's father designed is structurally unsound and likely to collapse.

Thatcher meets botanist Mary Treat for the first time and learns she is corresponding with Charles Darwin about evolution.

Thatcher's school principal openly challenges his scientific teachings, signaling a serious threat to Thatcher's position in Vineland.

Willa visits the local historical society and learns that botanist Mary Treat once lived near her property.

Thatcher gives a public speech defending Darwin's theories at a school symposium but leaves feeling he has failed.

Historical society docent Chris informs Willa that she is living in Thatcher Greenwood's former house, not Mary Treat's.

Thatcher debates Darwin's theories with his principal at a public forum run by Landis and loses the crowd's support.

Charles Landis publicly shoots newspaper editor Uri Carruth on the street after Carruth's paper implicates Landis's wife.

Nick, Iano's elderly father, dies peacefully at home after a long decline.

Carruth dies from his gunshot wound, and the prosecuting attorney asks Thatcher to testify at Landis's murder trial.

Rose tells Thatcher she has fallen in love with another man and demands that he grant her a divorce.

Thatcher testifies against Landis at trial, but the jury finds Landis not guilty on grounds of temporary insanity.

The novel follows two protagonists living on the same Vineland, New Jersey, property more than a century apart. Willa Knox inherits a crumbling house and faces financial crisis, her son's grief, and a growing fascination with the building's history. Meanwhile, Thatcher Greenwood fights to teach Darwin's theories in 1875 Vineland, facing opposition from the town's powerful founder Charles Landis. Both storylines are shaped by structural collapse—literal and social—as Thatcher's marriage fails and his closest ally is silenced by violence. Thatcher testifies at Landis's murder trial knowing it will cost him everything, while Willa and her family piece together a new life amid uncertainty. By the novel's end, both characters move toward hopeful but unknown futures away from the houses that have sheltered and confined them.

The headline events driving both storylines from beginning to end.

Willa reflects on the many career sacrifices she made over the years to support her husband Iano's academic ambitions.

Tig befriends two brothers who live next door, including Jorge, and begins working with him at a local restaurant.

The Knox family has a heated dinner debate about capitalism, environmental destruction, and growing economic inequality in America.

Willa drives her father-in-law Nick to a Philadelphia doctor but learns the family's new health insurance is not accepted.

President Ulysses Grant visits Vineland's school; Rose suffers a miscarriage but insists on attending the visit anyway.

Thatcher visits Mary on a pretense and confides his growing anxieties about his worsening conflict with the school principal.

Thatcher learns that Mary's estranged husband was a member of the spiritualism movement, revealing why their marriage failed.

A student with apparent romantic feelings for Iano unexpectedly shows up at the Knox family house in Vineland.

Willa and Iano talk late at night about the disappointments and financial struggles weighing on their long marriage.

Thatcher meets newspaper editor Uri Carruth at a town lecture and gains his first significant political ally in Vineland.

The Knox family celebrates a subdued Christmas together as the condition of their deteriorating house continues to worsen.

Willa and Iano drive through areas still visibly damaged by Hurricane Sandy and discuss the family's uncertain future.

Thatcher tracks down the comatose Carruth and learns from his wife that no Vineland doctor will agree to treat him.

Willa and Tig have a heated argument at the Vineland cemetery about Dusty's future, climate change, and parenting.

Zeke storms out of the family house after learning that his infant son Dusty will stay in Vineland with Tig.

Beyond the headline events, both storylines are filled with quieter but significant moments of conflict, connection, and pressure. Willa's family navigates practical hardships like insurance failures and low-wage work while debating the social forces—capitalism, climate change, immigration—that underpin their struggles. In 19th-century Vineland, Thatcher builds relationships with Mary Treat and journalist Uri Carruth that will define his path forward, even as Rose's miscarriage and social ambitions widen the gulf in their marriage. The Knox household faces the emotional strains of caregiving, marital disappointment, and Tig's search for her own identity. These secondary moments give texture and context to the novel's larger themes of shelter, belonging, and the cost of conformity. Together they reveal how both protagonists are slowly shaped by the personal and social pressures that surround them.

The personal and social tensions that shape the characters' lives.

Willa travels to Boston to help her son Zeke arrange Helene's funeral and care for the newborn Dusty.

Rose dismisses Thatcher's concerns about their failing house, refusing to accept that her late father built it poorly.

Thatcher sits with Mary Treat during her five-hour pitcher plant experiment, marking the beginning of their close friendship.

Nick accidentally blares conservative talk radio through open car windows at a student political protest outside Iano's university.

Historical society docent Chris shows Willa original letters that Charles Darwin sent to Mary Treat, astonishing her.

Tig and Jorge rush Nick to the emergency room as a violent storm forces the family to shelter in place.

The Knox family enrolls in Medicaid after repeated failures to find affordable private health insurance coverage.

Mary offers Thatcher the use of her carriage house so he can write and prepare his defense for the symposium.

Willa listens as Tig describes her years living in Cuba, including a romantic relationship with a married man there.

Zeke asks Willa and Iano to formally take on a legal guardian role for his infant son Dusty.

Rose takes her new friends on a day trip out of town to ensure they will not witness Thatcher's public debate.

Iano tells Willa he has been offered another year's teaching contract with strong long-term prospects at the Philadelphia university.

A dying Nick insists on visiting the Vineland cemetery to personally choose the location of his own burial plot.

A historical architect tells Willa that her current house was built five years after Thatcher Greenwood lived on the property.

Thatcher and Mary spend a peaceful summer day in the Pine Barrens and make plans to meet in Florida.

Unsheltered is a novel built on pivotal moments of revelation—discoveries that shift characters' understanding of themselves and the world they inhabit. Willa uncovers the history of her house piece by piece, learning it belonged to Thatcher Greenwood while Mary Treat's carriage house stands just next door, and she must also grapple with Tig's hidden struggles and Zeke's unwillingness to parent his own child. Thatcher's turning points arrive through his growing bond with Mary, whose scientific courage gives him the confidence to face his principal and Landis in public. Small decisions—Mary offering her carriage house, the family choosing Medicaid, Nick insisting on choosing his grave site—accumulate into a picture of people finding or losing their footing. By the end, both storylines resolve around characters choosing authenticity over security: Thatcher leaves Vineland, and Tig redefines what family and shelter can mean. These are the moments of insight and choice that drive the novel's emotional core.