Cockroft, a faded composer and socialite, lives in self-imposed exile and fantasizes of true love and extravagant suicides. Rattling around his dilapidated farmhouse in the Italian countryside, his only constant source of company is the ever-loyal Timoleon Vieta, a mongrel with the most beautiful eyes. When a handsome but surly individual arrives on the scene, Cockroft is forced to choose between his dog and this new arrival. He abandons Timoleon outside Rome's Colosseum, where the dog begins the long journey home. In this acclaimed novel, Dan Rhodes, one of Granta's Best Young British Novelists, has created a tragicomic work of macabre beauty that both amuses and moves in equal measure.