1970s. Clydebank, Scotland. 17 year old John is fresh out of school and on the dole; not even the local shipyards are hiring. After encountering a timid and shivering young schoolgirl struggling to make it down the hill in the snow, he starts escorting her to school. But with every passing day that he appears at the gates, the other parents grow increasingly wary and not just because he seems to be the only one who can see her. As the other parents grow more and more concerned by his presence and the local police brutally apprehend him as a 'troublemaker', John's visions of the girl and the supernatural continue to grow until not even his family or his parish priest can offer explanations. Committed and locked away in a psychiatric ward, and struggling to understand what is happening to him, John must bend to the rules of the mental institution, the clergy, the police and even his own concerned family. As John moves into adulthood, the perspective moves between him, his mother and his girlfriend. Told through their flashbacks and often contradictory visions of the supernatural, their three perspectives will work together to reveal a series of horrific events that have left a dark stain on the past. As well as being a gripping and twisted supernatural thriller, this novel asks the urgent questions about society's treatment of mental health and it teaches us that when murder mysteries and ghost stories are involved, all is almost never as it seems.