Pip Winter, a thirty-something jobbing actor, is engaged in a tempestuous tug-of-war with his unstable lover, Callum, and enjoys an embittered non-relationship with his father, Harry. When Harry becomes seriously ill and in need of a carer, Pip finds himself unwillingly responding to the paternal call. Returning home for the first time in years, he finds his unhappy past flooding back, with disturbing results. Secrets, lies and recriminations arise as the two men face each other over the years of silence. As the conflicting demands of career, lover and father escalate, Pip is forced to re-evaluate both himself and his father. Attrition, a family story with a bitter twist, is at once shocking and moving.