In every family, they exist: close relatives who disappeared early, remained strangers, leaving behind hardly anything, not even photos. From four life stories, Vicente Valero weaves a deeply moving family novel that evokes the poetic power of W.G. Sebald's "The Emigrants" while standing entirely on its own. So who is the unknown grandfather who was dispatched to an African desert garrison after his wedding night and only returned to Ibiza as a dying man? Who is the uncle who accompanied chess players around the world? Who is the young brother-in-law, the star who left the island for a dance career? And who, finally, is the other grandfather, who remained loyal as an officer of the Republic and never returned home from French exile? Four lost sons who, as strangers, always leave behind a piece of incomprehensible past.