Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of racism.

Mike feels compelled to return to Sara Laughs for the sake of his writing, four years after Jo’s death. Having run out of backup material to share with his publishers, Mike wants to prove to himself that he can separate his relationship with Jo from his ability as a writer. The fact that he keeps having surreal dreams about Sara Laughs signals to him that he still has the imaginative capacity for writing. Once he arrives, however, the lines between what is true and false become blurred, leading to the novel’s exploration of the tensions between truth and fiction. 

Shortly after he arrives at Dark Score Lake, Mike is thrust into several events that feel straight out of his commercial novels. He becomes involved in a legal battle between an underdog single mother and a ruthless tycoon. He experiences a macabre haunting tied to the history of the nearby lake. He also learns about a secret life his late wife led, forcing him to wonder how much he really knew about her. Mike’s return to Sara Laughs forces him to reassess his interest in fiction and what is or isn’t merely his imagination at work.