Sean O'Reilly's characters inhabit a world that can seem dangerously indifferent to human feeling but alive to the thrills of living on the edge. Unnecessary risks are taken which are punished, not obscured, by family; dangerous brothers and traditional, hardened fathers wield power, usually with brutality. The stories in what was O'Reilly's debut collection present us with a harsh and unsentimental view of the mundane, underscored by moments of great beauty, humour and pathos.