In this novel, Maggie Gee speculates about the survival of love between men and women in a frozen future world where children are rare, child-size robots run out of control and homosexuality is the norm. Far into the the twenty-first century, civilisation has broken down in the face of the deepening cold. An old man, Saul, lives in a disused airport with a gang of wild boys, who spare his life only because of his skills as a storyteller. Saul tells of his youth, days of fierce heat and dwindling fertility. Men and women live separately, or "segged". The women cluster around the rare children; men turn to each other or to robot "pets". Saul is different...he falls in love with Sarah.