He got down on his hands and knees and reached in under the bed where he kept his toolbox. Careful not to make a sound, he searched desperately for a weapon of defence. Then the bedroom door creaked behind him and he knew he was no longer alone in the room...' When one of the few remaining villagers in Leaca is murdered, suspicion falls on the one resident Englishman and outsider, Nick Ambrose. As tensions rise and old forms of law threaten to impose summary justice, the easy and rich fabric of life that has sustained the town for so many years unravels and tears with shocking results. Set in rural western Ireland in 1948, Patrick McGinley's novel is a gripping and powerful exploration of community, violence and Irish ways.