From her hospital bed in Dublin, the elderly Dilly awaits the visit of her daughter, Eleanora, from London. The epochs of her life pass before her; emigrating to America in the 1920s, a romantic liaison she had there, the destiny that brought her back to Ireland, and her marriage. She also retraces Eleanora's precipitate marriage to a foreigner, and Dilly's heart-rending letters sent over the years in a determination to reclaim her daughter.

Eleanora's visit does not prove to be the glad reunion that it might have been and, in her sudden departure, she leaves behind the secret journal of their stormy relationship.

The Light of Evening is a novel of dreams and broken dreams but, at its core, is the realisation that the bond between mother and child is unbreakable, stronger even than death.