Tracing a true parent does not always produce the hoped-for, happy outcome.Attempts to form a relationship can flounder without the security of the familiar. Disappointment is a possibility and also the opposite - a euphoria that can develop into an intensity of feeling difficult to cope with. When Alex erupts, totally unexpectedly into his mother's life, the obsession which takes hold of them both, fractures her marriage and his. People around them are deeply affected. Dramatic changes are inevitable. The reader is left with the fragile hope that something may yet be salvaged fromjthe damage.