Jake' s dad is away and his pregnant mum is in hospital, so his granny is looking after Jake - or so they think. But Gran has changed. She tends to be dazed or confused, fills Jake' s sandwiches with strange combinations of food, leaves the cooker on, and wanders down the road in her nightie in the middle of the night. Jake doesn' t want to worry his parents, so he tries to look after Gran himself. But help comes from a mysterious quarter, in the form of a strange, ghostly girl called Verity.

Birth, death, and the rites of passage in family life that connect them are beautifully portrayed through the eyes of a young teenage boy.