Nogs struggling in the lowest echelons of society seek a way out. But does the gun in their hand shoot bullets or seal their own fate? Vine, having long abandoned hopes of social decency, stumbles into love again in middle-age. Should she even dare to hope? Belle, a local political fixer, buys elections with piles of cash but can’t hold her disintegrating family together. Veteran reporter Chien-ho returns home to find his childhood town on the cusp of a divisive election. Are his writing skills enough to cool his hometown’s hotheads and to find reconciliation with his father?Set amidst a mayoral election, this work plumbs a complex landscape of local politics as well as people’s everyday struggles and aspirations, the perspectives and passions of women in politics, the volatility introduced into social relations by “political fixers”, and the power and impotence of media figures. The narrative also explores the vulnerability of each character to monetary enticements and the complex interplay of personal fixations.