Pierre Cormier had secrets. He was especially silent about what had happened to him in Lebanon, the country he fled. Five years after a boating accident, Pierre is at last declared dead. At the reading of the will, Pierre wanted a "roast" at a bar at The Only Café in Toronto. He'd even left a guest list that included one mysterious name: Ari. Cyril's personal investigation is entangled in the larger news story, all of it twining into a fabric of lies and deception that stretches from contemporary Toronto back to the massacre at the Sabra and Shatila camps in Lebanon in September 1982.