Chance events and well-intentioned conspiracies can bring people together in unlikely and sometimes comical liaisons. It is 1970, and diffident young mathematician Andrew Carter has just left the security and prestige of Cambridge to begin a junior lectureship at a university situated in northern England. There he runs into Toby Martin, an old school friend, who invites him to his family's country residence for his half-sister's fifteenth birthday-and to serve as a buffer between Toby and his domineering mother, who wishes Andrew could somehow solve her odd sock problem. Over the weekend, Andrew conspires with Toby and Antonia to rescue their older half-sister from their dominating mother's influence, and Andrew grows close to Antonia.
Some thirty years later, Andrew-who is single again-receives a call from Sir Oliver Laine, Member of Parliament and speculative dealer, who arranges for Andrew to commute between an Oxford college and Vietnam as a statistical adviser in medical trials and, incidentally, to help him launch a dubiously effective antidepressant. But after Andrew arrives in Hanoi, he meets a homeless orphan. Suddenly, a chance meeting changes everything for Andrew once again.
Odd Socks is the compelling tale of one man's journey through the unforeseen as he weathers tragedies and mishaps with aplomb.