With the death of his elderly aunt, Lake finds himself taking an unexpected detour from the itinerary of his daily life.

Not only has Ilsa bequeathed to him her home in the elegant Chestnut Hill section of the city, a house overstuffed, moldy with age, as lifeless as a corpse; she has also stipulated in her will that Lake must care for her beloved dog, Randall - as long as the dog shall live, and in the style to which he has become accustomed: pampered, fed, and doted upon in the house at 73 Peal Avenue.

As Lake reluctantly takes up residence in his new home, one unwanted springer spaniel in tow, and with seemingly far too many rooms for one man's life to fill, he finds the existence he has known thus far - easily compartmentalized, and about as exciting as an instructional manual - slowly but surely begin to unravel. His repeated, frequently hilarious attempts to free himself of canine companionship prove to be exercises in futility.

The scene in which Randall happily climbs into the bathtub with Lake for a session of hair coloring - the dog's, not the man's - is alone worth the price of admission; and a storm at sea that pitches both dog and master into rough water comes to an equally amusing (and unexpected) conclusion.

Equally important, Lake's clandestine scheme to sell the house with the help of the lovely, unwitting realtor Jennifer Dee propels him into what is, for him, virgin territory: he begins to fall in love. And as his burgeoning feelings for Jennifer force him to open doors to rooms he has never quite had the courage to inhabit, he finds himself surrendering the key to the door most stubbornly resistant to entry: the door to his heart.