A lot of people, just like Jim, some of whom are very successful in life, are haunted by memories from their childhood.

Not so many of them, however, are likely to have made such a bizarre mistake as the one he has just made. He can't believe what actually happened with a girl he met in a church.

Even if you feel a little unsympathetic towards people like him, who are hindered in their pathway through life by things like this, is it possible, as you read his story, that you will begin to see some of your own problems in a different light?

Although you may have good reason to believe that you have the best boss in the world, like Alex Tennent, or that you have a partner beyond reproach, unlike Avril Hayes, are you absolutely sure about this? Jim himself isn't sure about any of these things but very gradually he begins to see a connection between a particularly unhappy memory from his boyhood and the precarious situation in which he now finds himself.

As he wields his stopwatch and tries to compete in the rat race; is he becoming as some might say, an egocentric obsessive with social interaction problems? Or, is he really just a victim of one of these great evils that never find their way into the Statute Book?

Whichever of the two you choose to believe may well have far-reaching consequences for it is possible that you are, or are about to become, one of these victims yourself.