Sophie Harper is abandoned by her husband and left with a four - year - old daughter to support. She finds work in an old house in Canberra that is being used as a brothel. She falls under the house's eerie, yet strangely comforting spell, and discovers within herself not only the ability to perform well, and delight in the freedom bought by an independent income, but the capacity to learn from the men and women she encounters there. One of these men, Jack, teaches her more about revenge than she ever wished to know.