An exquisite novel in which times of action are mixed and intertwined, and the summer spent by the wealthy Ramsey family on the Isle of Skye turns out to be a kind of British "chronicle of lost time" - a fragile, almost idyllic time, doomed to be destroyed soon by the First World War. Children will grow up - someone will survive and grow up, someone will lay their heads on the battlefields. Small failures and grievances will be forgotten. The old house will be abandoned, the garden will grow. But will the dream of a trip to a distant lighthouse come true even for one of Ramsey's children? ..