Growth is often associated with moving on. It’s a commonly posed question, for example, whether one should ever vacation in the same place twice. If travel broadens the mind, the argument goes, then a travel itinerary should be as broad as the horizon. There’s such a lot of the world to see: Why go back again?

Toward the end of David Nicholls’ 2009 novel, One Day, Dexter Mayhew returns to Edinburgh, the city in which he met his love interest, Emma Morley, at the start of the novel. He climbs Arthur’s Seat, just as he did with Emma almost 20 years earlier. By now, he has fallen in love, married, known fame, learned humility. His companion is also different: not Emma, who died, but his young daughter, Jasmine. And yet, much remains the same. Climbing the hill with his daughter is ...