Set in the late 1940s in the village of Dalkey (some twelve miles south of Dublin), The Dalkey Archive also includes in its cast the mad scientist De Selby (featured in O'Brien's novel The Third Policeman), the magniloquent Sergeant Fottrell (whose "molly-cule theory" holds that a man can turn into a bicycle), and the local da Vinci, a looderamawn named Teague McGettigan. Doing his damnedest to find order in this metaphysical chaos is Mick Shaughnessy, who--with the aid of strong drink, his friend Hackett, and Mary, the young woman for whom they both compete--undergoes a crisis of faith both sublime and ridiculous.