Lucas's brother Thomas is dying. His blood platelet count has suddenly and catastrophically fallen, for reasons his doctors are finding hard to establish; on the Ile de Re in south-western France, the holiday home of their childhood, the two brothers wait for Lucas to die.<BR>Lucas interweaves the chronicle of his brother's death with memories of their childhood and adolescence, their jealousies and rivalries, their unspoken bonds, beside which the wider world - parents, partners, friends - fade into relative insignificance. As those around them withdraw from this inexplicable, inexorable death, Lucas and Thomas retreat to their childhood paradise to wait for the end.