In the seaside town of Tramore, County Waterford, visitors arrive in waves with the tourist season, reliving the best days of their childhoods in its caravan parks, chippers and amusement arcades. Local teenager Helen Grant is indifferent to the charm of her surroundings; she dreams of escaping to art college with her glamorous classmate Stella Swaine and, from there, taking on the world.

But leaving Tramore is easier said than done. Though they don't yet know it, Helen and Stella's lives are pulled by tides beyond their control.

'This book is everything. The characters are painfully, beautifully real, the writing is impeccable...I loved it.' Marian Keyes

'Unputdownable...one of the best novels of the year' Sunday Independent

'Flannery's flawed, hopeful characters live and grow on the page'   Anne Enright, author of The Gathering

'Brilliant...her sentences crackle with life, energy and devastating insight into the human condition. She writes with a rare combination of compassion and black humour. Her characters live on in my mind like people I have always known' Lia Mills