A wacky television weatherman thinks his life is perfect except for an erratic relationship with a style-conscious girlfriend. Then, one bright and smoggy L.A. day, an electronic freeway sign changes his life, when its advice leads him into a frivolous romance with a young and beautiful blond and, ultimately, to true love with the woman of his dreams.

A man who was a confidant of Adolf Hitler dies and leaves a fortune to make amends for his Nazi past, but his son has to search the world to find it.

Set in a future where fundamentalists have established "the Republic of Gilead", the handmaids of the title are those few women who can still bear children after the combined ravages of chemical pollution and civil war. A woman, Kate, is caught trying to escape the soldiers of the Republic and is found to be fertile, marking her for handmaid servitude, but also bringing her within the society of the ruling elite.

Follows the paths of two families, the Henrys and the Jastrows, as they fight to survive the Second World War.