Nobody knows why John Baird, a quiet family man, decided one day to pick up a shotgun and murder his wife and children. On the remote Scottish island of Skellag, violent crime is unheard of, and the killings sent shockwaves through this tiny community in which the Bairds were well-known and liked.

Tommy, the only survivor of the terrible crime, has returned to Skellag many years later. Faced with this reminder of the horrors that took place amongst them, the community must ask themselves again how much responsibility we have to know our neighbors. What drives a man to murder his own family? And to what extent is Tommy his father’s son?

With unflinching candor and powerful prose, Rebecca Wait interrogates the damaging legacy of toxic masculinity for a family and a community. Brave and urgent, Our Fathers shows how deeply family can wound and how it can offer our greatest solace.