In The Heather Fields, Reynolds' only friend has drowned and his neighbours have turned against him. Facing a cold and lonely future, he is simply marking time until his death, with only some pigs, chickens and the scolding shade of his mother for company. Life is as cruel as the land in The Eye of the Beholder. Living alone on a small, failing farm, Augustine Honeywell yearns for companionship, but God has dealt him 'a hand with not even one trump. Not an ace, not a king, not a knave; and above all, not a queen.' And in Down on the Farm, a modest lottery win allows the lustful Valentine Kidney to escape the 'wholesome and disinfected petting' that passes for romance in Killnamaine. Set in island communities in small-town rural Ireland, peopled with the marginalized and forgotten, these nine stories address life's most profound questions - the nature of existence and the purpose of being.