Frances Egan, ‘a smart-looking woman of forty-two’, seems to lead a charmed life.  A scholar of national distinction in the field of management, she was recently shoehorned into the role of head of school by a vice-chancellor who needed a woman ‘for the appearance of the thing’. Driven by ambition (she wants to be a professor), she accepted. She and her husband, Tom, a cabinetmaker committed to traditional methods of woodcraft, live with their two children, Margie and ‘little Tommy’, on a farm near Castlemaine they bought last year, fulfilling a lifelong dream.

There are downsides, naturally. Little Tommy has no friends at school; Tom’s commissions are rare and chancy; it’s a two-hour commute each way to Fran’s work; most of her staff don’t seem to like her much; her dean is a capricious bully. Yet Fran, until a few weeks ago, believed she had it all: ‘The perfect job and the perfect family.’

Now her life has been turned upside-down by a one-night stand at a conference in Hafei. The liaison, which she prefers to think of as a time of pure passion and self-knowledge with a man she unfathomably labels her ‘Mongolian warrior’, will never be repeated. Although she knows his name and they work in related fields, they have agreed not to contact each other. Both are married. He promises to think of her when he looks at the moon.

The novel unfolds in step with Fran’s thoughts: looping, random, associative, too often repetitive. She will never tell her secret, she decides time and again. Everyone seems to guess anyway. ‘What happened in China?’, asks ten-year-old Tommy accusingly. Teenaged Margie wants to know why ‘things aren’t the same with you two’. ‘Something happened in China, didn’t it?’ says Tom. ‘We all need a break,’ Fran responds, and suggests Europe, whether for distraction or reconciliation isn’t clear.