Winner of the 2004 Somerset Maugham Award: Gripping, insightful, and deft—a haunting story about the ways our families shape our lives, from the award-winning author of Hamnet and The Marriage Portrait.
On a cold February afternoon, Stella catches sight of a man she hasn't seen for many years, but instantly recognises. Or thinks she does. At the same moment on the other side of the globe, in the middle of a crowd of Chinese New Year revellers, Jake realises that things are becoming dangerous.
They know nothing of one another's existence, but both Stella and Jake flee their lives: Jake in search of a place so remote it doesn't appear on any map, and Stella for a destination in Scotland, the significance of which only her sister, Nina, will understand.