Aren't you tired of a past littered with escapes? Think about the woman you're becoming!' Leonie said, trying to prevent Cassie's flight. The past denied and her dance championship dreams discarded, Cassie Sleight leaves home. In the seemingly idyllic coastal town of Keimera, she starts a career on the English staff of the local high school. Contact with Mark Talbut, a man struggling to be modern yet threatened by power shifts in the workplace and in society, causes Cassie to assess her reactions as a woman and a teacher. As she does so, the secrets of her past surface. Will that past continue to choreograph Cassie's present steps? What sort of woman does she become? 'In and Out of Step', as the name suggests, explores the way Cassie Sleight uses dance as a way to interpret life and process her reactions to it. The title also alludes to changing gender relationships in a world where men and women move in and out of step with changing expectations of women in the workforce and in relationships. It is a story about friendship and family, types of love, gender politics and power, sexual encounters and sexual harassment, and changing societal views about male and female relationships. Its darker messages are lightened by regular injections of wry, tender, funny and illuminating observations in inner thought, dialogue, and experiences.