At an English public school, five students – Liz (the narrator of many flash backs), Mike (the protagonist of most of the student's time in The Hole"), Alex, Frankie and Geoff – are lured into an abandoned cellar by a malevolent prankster named Martyn.

Liz also keeps tapes of interviews with a girl named "Lisa" who talks of her romantic relationship with Martyn.

In the Hole, they become increasingly desperate for food, beginning to face up to the fact that Martyn's experiment was really to play God with all of them.

At one point Mike believes he sees the keyhole of the trapdoor locking them in the Hole "winking" at him, but dismisses this on grounds that he is hallucinating, or so he thinks.

Liz formulates a plan to test their theory, by saying how lucky they are to have light, to see if Martyn turns off the electricity.