Oliver Gurth Perkins is 75, and the darkest cloud on his horizon is that the local bookshop no longer stocks collected volumes of the Times cryptic crosswords. He has an easy companionship with his wife; his dental practice is undemanding; his son is a decent enough sort; and his granddaughter who comes for the school holidays is a delight. But when a minor heart episode convinces Oliver that its time to put a little more time into the lives of those close to him, further shocks are in store. Change of heart traces Olly's passage from the desolation of his first realisation that Hester is quite happy with the way things are and has no desire for more intimate communication with him, to his happy embrace of an extended family life.