'Time is not an arrow. Neither is it a road. It goes in no particular direction. It simply accumulates — in the body, in the world — like wood does. Layer upon layer. Light then dark. Each one dependent upon the last. Each year impossible without the one preceding it. Each triumph and each disaster written forever in its structure.'

This remarkable novel, structured like the rings of a tree, travels from a futuristic world in which barely any forests remain to the start of the twentieth century, where two young boys survive a train crash, setting them on a path that will change their lives. Moving from the future to the present to the past, and back again, this magnificent generational saga tells the story of one family and their enduring connection to the place that brought them together.