'Nobody loved the Pissimbonis. They lived in an ivy-clad house at the top of a hill, far enough away from the other houses for everyone to think of them as living outside the town. The family comprised many brothers and sisters and nobody even knew if the paterfamilias and his wife, Ignacio and Martina Pissimboni, were still alive. They were never seen around the Town, whose inhabitants had long ago stopped thinking of them. Nobody loved them nor did anyone care about the family. And they didn't love or care about anyone else, either.' Sonia Hernandez spins a surprising tale with shades of Kafka, skilfully pushing the boundaries of fiction and creating a beautiful metaphor about freedom.