From first love to final reckoning, this luminous suite of short fiction by master storyteller Dermot Bolger captures the heartbreak and hope that define us. In a series of unexpected moments when past loves and choices re-surface with startling clarity, the imperfect beings who populate these stories find themselves finally grasping the impact of crucial early relationships, as joy, loss and betrayal echo across decades. A man searches for a possible secret half-sister to understand his father. A woman is haunted by a boy’s death fifty years ago. A lighthouse keeper recalls his first relationship. A public figure, slipping into dementia, relives a fateful night that haunts him. A man seeks insights into his mother’s past on a remote Portuguese island. From childhood holidays shadowed by tragedy to chance reunions that rewrite old narratives, Bolger’s complex and deeply humane characters reveal the fragile beauty of human connection.