In this stunning debut short story collection, John Patrick McHugh explores betrayal and longing on an imagined island off the west coast of Ireland, delving into a community of individuals who are lost, yearning, and mired in delusion. We see two boys set fires while their worlds fall apart, a couple driving out to the hills in a last-ditch effort to save their marriage, a widow seeking a stranger's help to bury her grief, even a horse crashing a house party.

"This astonishing collection of stories draws the reader into a world at once familiar and deliciously strange … exquisite and arresting."—Sally Rooney