I have read all 3 books in the Roth Trilogy and very much enjoyed them all but this one is my favourite. It's set in the small village of Roth in Middlesex in the 1970's where David Byfield is a widowed parish priest. The course of the book sees his meeting and subsequent marriage to Vanessa, a marriage that seems to be the catalyst to a train of unsavoury events with a darker undertone, the true magnitude of which, only becomes clear at the very end. The story is well laid out and easy to follow with each character well established, not least the every present Miss Oliphant. I don't want to give too much away but the way it links to the other books in the Trilogy is excellent.