From nineteenth-century Sweden to Renaissance Italy, Hansen weaves together exquisite stories in a searching and impressive enquiry into why things happen the way they do...

Bolt has died and lies in his coffin reflecting on the past. An eccentric scientist, he devoted his life to a vast research undertaking - collecting random incidents from the history of the species and finding the underlying pattern that connects them. His reveries lead him to tell two other tales - one of a doomed lighthouse keeper on a Swedish island and another of rivalry among Renaissance artists - until, finally, he tells a startling tale from his own early manhood.