On a warm May night in San Francisco, the Ritz-Carlton ballroom shimmers with crystal and silver as a glittering, celebrity-studded crowd gathers for a charity dinner dance. The evening is perfect-until, just minutes before midnight, the room begins to sway. Glass shatters. And as the lights go out, people begin to scream ... In the earthquake's aftermath, the lives of four strangers will converge ... Sarah Sloane, the beautiful wife of a financial whiz, watches her perfect world fall to pieces ... Grammy-winning singer Melanie Free, the event's headliner, comes to a turning point in her life and career ... Photographer Everett Carson, a former war correspondent whose personal demons have demoted him to covering society parties, finds new purpose amid the carnage ... and Sister Maggie Kent, a nun who normally works in jeans and high-tops with the homeless, searches through the rubble-and knows instantly that there is much work to be done ...