About this audiobook
An account of a journey leads into a Serbian household troubled by the absence of its elderly father. His warning about the conditions of his return gives the family a disturbing choice between affection and fear. When familiar appearances become uncertain, the wish to welcome someone home can no longer be separated from the danger of misunderstanding who has arrived.
Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy develops the atmosphere through a traveller's observations and the family's different responses. Domestic closeness gives the supernatural possibility its particular force: the source of protection may also become the source of unease. Trust depends on signs that the characters cannot interpret with complete confidence.
The tale explores attachment, suspicion and the vulnerability of a household facing something that ordinary experience cannot explain. Its framed narration invites readers to follow the gradual disturbance of a familiar world, where the strongest reason to believe another person can also make it difficult to recognise a threat.
