An exquisite novel in which the periods of action intertwine and overlap, and the summer spent by the wealthy Ramsey family on the island 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. When the children grow up, someone will survive and become older, someone will lay down their head on the fields of battle. Small failures and resentments will be forgotten. The old house will be abandoned, the garden will grow wild.
But will the dream of a trip to a faraway lighthouse ever come true for at least one of the Ramsey children?...