Johnny Major, a Sicilian-born magnate and creator of a network of restaurant-club-casinos across Europe and North America, dies and his will goes missing. Johnny’s death then forces his beloved daughter Elissa—a small-animal veterinarian in East Anglia—to confront various ex-wives, her own fierce mother, twin half-siblings, duplicitous lawyers, and a village full of Sicilians, including her father’s ghost and old women paid to scream at funerals. Her journey explores the sometimes funny, sometimes deadly serious qualities of life.