Hidden behind the walls of Grangegorman Mental Hospital in 1941, four lives collide, all afflicted by the human cost of wars, betrayals and trauma.
Gus, a shrewd attendant, is the keeper of everyone's secrets, especially his own. Two War of Independence veterans are reunited. One, Jimmy Nolan, has spent twenty years as a psychiatric patient, unable to recover from his involvement in youthful killings. In contrast, Francis Dillon has prospered as a businessman, until rumours of Civil War atrocities cause his collapse, suffering delusions of enemies seeking to kill him.
Doctor Fairfax has fled London after his gay lover's death. Desperate to rekindle a sense of purpose, Fairfax tries to help Dillon recover by getting him to talk about his past. But a code of silence surrounds the traumatic violence Ireland has endured. Is Dillon willing to break his silence to find a way back to his family?
In this superb evocation of hidden worlds, master storyteller Dermot Bolger explores the aftershock within people who participate in violence and the fault-lines in all post-conflict societies only held together by collective amnesia.



![Koren Zailckas: Smashed [2005]](http://chaptersbookstore.com/cdn/shop/files/9780091905590_{width}x.jpg?v=1762459392)
![Barbara Erskine: Hiding From the Light [2003] paperback](http://chaptersbookstore.com/cdn/shop/files/9780006512080_{width}x.jpg?v=1762459146)
![Paul Doherty: Corpse Candle (Hugh Corbett Mysteries, Book 13) [2001] paperback](http://chaptersbookstore.com/cdn/shop/files/9780747264675_{width}x.jpg?v=1762459200)
![Christian Jacq: The Judgement of the Mummy [2010] paperback](http://chaptersbookstore.com/cdn/shop/files/9781847397850_{width}x.jpg?v=1762459134)
![Shirley Benton: Looking for Leon [2011]](http://chaptersbookstore.com/cdn/shop/files/9781842234853_{width}x.jpg?v=1762459194)