A follow-on volume to "Maura's Boy", this is the story of the young priest as he learns to communicate with the sick and dying. Newly ordained, boyish, idealistic and naive, Father Christy Kenneally is sent as chaplain to a home for the terminally in Cork, as well as having pastoral duties in a nearby school. His formation as a priest in Maynooth - where the words death and bereavement are never mentioned in his hearing - does little to prepare him for the scores of patients and their relatives to whom he is expected to bring comfort.