Young Tristan, a curious boy who rescues all sorts of objects from the rubbish
dump, finds an old Viewmaster in its elaborate box, complete with a set of
disks. He finds that these represent the ages of humankind, seen as a cyclical
structure in which patterns of growth and decay are repeated. Tristan becomes
more and more drawn in to the world of the disks, and eventually disappears.
The book is full of metaphors and symbols of seeing and watching, circularity
and never-endingness, in a complex, fantastical tale, which was Shaun Tans
first picture book.