Ann and Julia/Jules, later to become Julius, Adelaide-based teenagers, arrange for Jules to become a boy so as to be Ann's dominant lover and eventually her husband, Ann's mum, dying of cancer, agrees to her husband Hector, later Hec, to start a relationship with Glen, someone he meets through work, which will render Hec a woman in order to become Glen's heterosexual spouse or partner. The Medical Ethics Commission of South Australia agrees to both gender alignments, a doctor is found in the person of Brendan McGroom, on Saipan, the Mariana Islands, newly reinstated. Ann's mother wins, posthumously, a quiz competition, the prize will translate into a journey for Ann and her-still-father-to Saipan, the magazine will fund Jules and part of the medical expenses, they are sending a newly-widowed reporter, Elanca Hartwig who is briefly seduced on arrival by Brendan. Glen, in addition to Hec, acquires Jules' mother and a young local-born researcher, Aline, while on Saipan, Jules father teams up with Elanca and is given consultant work, as are Glen, Hec and their team, as job and industry creation specialists. Jules, now Julius, barely survives a postoperative complication caused by his surgically crafted penis, then Ann persuades their mutual teenage lover, a local part Vietnamese girl called Angh, to join their poly-amorous relationship.