Julian Treslove, a professionally unspectacular and disappointed BBC worker, and Sam Finkler, a popular philosopher, writer and television personality, are old school friends. Despite very different lives, they've never quite lost touch with each other - or with their former teacher, Libor Sevcik. Now, both Libor and Finkler are recently widowed, and with Treslove, his chequered and unsuccessful record with women rendering him an honorary third widower, they dine at Libor's central London apartment. And it's that very evening, at exactly 11:30pm, Treslove is attacked. After this, his whole sense of who and what he is will slowly and ineluctably change.?