A daughter searches a foreign city for her father, hoping to uncover the truth behind his disappearance. A widow tries to hunt down an unknown woman who secretly leaves flowers on her husband’s grave, tormented by doubts they cause about her past. A former lover of Roger Casement stands among crowds at his state funeral, paying silent homage to the clandestine world they were forced to inhabit. A novelist at a book launch is confronted by the only other person aware of the secret behind his success. Another writer is summoned to visit a dying stranger who seems convinced they have spent their lives locked in bitter rivalry. A child is killed outside the home of a woman who seems powerless to prevent her garden wall being transformed into a permanent shrine.

In his first collection of short stories, Dermot Bolger peers under the veneer of our lives, exploring the secrets that bind families together – or tear them apart – creating worlds where people find that nothing is truly certain. There are always truths just beyond reach that would make sense of their lives, if they only know how to unlock them.