A House in Fragments

High on an island hilltop sits a wood and glass fortress. Built for a genius, it once dominated the surrounding population, human and otherwise. Now an object of ridicule, it houses a lonely recluse barricaded in an attic, terrorized by the possibility of contact with the world. He ventures out only at night to collect stray bits of moss and lichen for what he believes is his art.

Or is it a house at all? To the inhabitants of the island's east shore, it's a driftwood hut. A ruin. Sheltering a hermit in which they only half believe. A madman invented by estate agents out to explain why no one climbs to the invisible summit. Uncongenial to development.

Or perhaps it is neither of those. When a series of inexplicable weather events forces the hermit and a troubled resident of the east shore onto a collision course with one another, both begin to wonder.

A haunting portrayal of what may or may not be mental illness, what may or may not be the thin space between incompatible worlds, A House in Fragments is also a story of the marvelous that permeates everyday life-and of the crossing points that sane people dismiss as a trick of the mind.

There's also a petulant faun.