Everyone has something to give you, if you can forgive yourself for taking it... A creative writing academic realises he is undeniably attracted to his female colleague ¿ the poet ¿ calling into question his supposedly open relationship with his partner, Michael. Michael is beautiful. Michael has money. He has a life with Michael, who brings him his first cup of tea every morning and packs him calorie-counted lunches. But the poet is something new. She is everything he isn¿t. While he writes about sex and sweat, she writes about birds and the sea. He is enraptured. Meanwhile, his homophobic and spiteful mother ¿ who cast a shadow over his childhood ¿ is continuing to make his life difficult from her care home. Michael is being annoyingly reasonable about it all. Then, simultaneous illnesses throw everything into free fall. Forever battling his sharper, selfish side, and often baffled by the kindness others seem to deem him deserving of, he flounders, spirals and begins to implode.
