It's a familiar story, this time set in Ireland and London. The young narrator writes a critical article on the "famous" writer and soon becomes privy to his world and that of the literati who surround him. Here Kyle Magee, "the Zorba of the North", subjects our stary-eyed admirer to all the pretension, hypocrisy, and paranoia he can handle. Counter balancing this is the Herron household, a group of eccentric women who are tough, no-nonsense realists.