The narrative begins in media res, in the present tense, with Amelia Wright describing a winter drive from London through the Scottish Highlands during a February snowstorm. She and her husband, Adam, along with their Labrador retriever, Bob, are in an older car, a Morris Minor, at night. She relates many details about their lives. Her asides about their marriage intertwine with the tense description of the trip and the testy banter. She won the Scottish excursion in a raffle at the Battersea Dogs Home where she works. The trip is one final attempt to save their marriage. Amelia does the driving, as Adam has never had a license.

Amelia says that Adam has a condition called prosopagnosia, which prevents him from recognizing the faces of people he sees, even that of his wife. Amelia expresses remorse over the sad condition of their marriage: “[B]ehind closed doors, things have been wrong with Mr. and Mrs. Wright for a long time” (6). Adam is a screenwriter who finds obscure novels and turns them into bankable movies. Amelia is proud of him, even though he’s so devoted to his work that he has grown emotionally distant from her.