A brilliantly observed modern morality tale, Talitha Stevenson’s explores the terrible effects of deceit, obsession, and shame on a dangerously complacent family. Alistair Langford, a respected and powerful barrister, has been hiding his past since he left his hometown of Dover to study at Oxford in the late 1950s. Embarrassed by his working-class upbringing in a guesthouse run by his single mother, with whom he has not had any contact for forty years, he has lied about himself to everyone in his life since Oxford, including his wife, Rosalind, and his two children, Luke and Sophie. But after the death of his mother and a one-night stand with a devious defense witness, his tightly woven tapestry of lies begins to unravel. is a deftly plotted, psychologically suspenseful, and compulsively readable novel from one of the most exciting young fiction writers today.