Set in South Africa during the mid-1990s, this memoir centres on Helena Kriel's brother Evan, one of the country's early HIV diagnoses, whose illness has been kept secret within the family. As he becomes paralysed and blind, his approaching death forces his parents and siblings to confront fear, shame, love and their need for control. Kriel portrays an unconventional family living through both intimate crisis and a nation's transition out of apartheid.