Recovering from the recent death of his wife in a cliff fall, Tony Sheridan goes to stay with her sister and her husband at their house in Rutland. The house, called Otherways, is in some senses a character in the story: a strange, circular, moted construction dating from Edwardian times. Disturbed by memories of his wife and a growing attraction to her sister, and troubled by vivid dreams, Sheridan learns that a murder committed at the house in 1939 still has resonances for those living in the neighbourhood, including the sister of the murdered woman.