After the suicide of his best friend, seventeen-year-old Ellis finds his predictable life spiraling into a chaotic, surreal twenty-four-hour odyssey. Ellis attempts to navigate the lingering trauma of his past while being pulled into the orbit of two mysterious sisters, Ursa and Leo. As he abandons his conventional plans for university, he faces a series of increasingly bizarre and dangerous situations, including a kidnapping investigation. The narrative unfolds in a strict, hour-by-hour structure that forces the protagonist to confront his own identity and the fragility of existence.

This novel is characterized by its intense, claustrophobic pacing and its willingness to embrace surrealism within a contemporary setting. The narrative structure effectively mirrors the protagonist's disorientation, creating a sense of urgency that persists throughout the twenty-four-hour timeframe. The work is noted for its psychological depth, particularly in how it handles the lingering, unspoken trauma of a friend's suicide. Readers often find the shift from mundane teenage concerns to high-stakes drama to be a disorienting but deliberate stylistic choice by the author. The book remains a distinct example of how Mahy uses unconventional plot mechanics to examine the volatility of the adolescent experience.