Ryan Chandler, a successful but apathetic student, drops out of university and is soon leading a rudderless existence. Living at home, working a dead-end part-time job, but deeply dissatisfied, he accepts a rare opportunity to pursue his own research project. Soon installed in the German city of Karlsruhe, Ryan throws himself into his project, studying aspects of the first-ever international scientific meeting and focussing on the contributions to that meeting made by one of the delegates, a man who ultimately becomes a famous Italian chemist.

Aspects of his project gradually draw Ryan's interest toward Italian unification, the Risorgimento, and some of the charismatic characters involved in that struggle. But he is also attracted to a 160-year-old mystery, and it soon becomes clear that he is not the only one interested. Ryan has stumbled across something treacherous, with unknown depths. A dark violence begins to engulf Ryan's friends, his family, and himself. In Rome, hints appear as to the nature of that violence, which reveals itself in Sicily and follows him back to Karlsruhe.

Sicilian Refuge weaves past and present together in a story of personal growth, loss, and retribution.