**From the acclaimed, award-winning author--when a dinner-party guest
named Miles locks himself in an upstairs room and refuses to come out,
he sets off a media frenzy. He also sets in motion a mesmerizing puzzle
of a novel, one that harnesses acrobatic verbal playfulness to a truly
affecting story.
**
Miles communicates only by cryptic notes slipped under the door. We see
him through the eyes of four people who barely know him, ranging from a
precocious child to a confused elderly woman. But while the characters'
wit and wordplay soar, their story remains profoundly grounded. As it
probes our paradoxical need for both separation and true connection,
There but for the balances cleverness with compassion, the surreal
with the deeply, movingly real, in a way that only Ali Smith can.