The narrator is a ghostwriter, more accustomed to penning the autobiographies of footballers and rock stars. He is hired to write the memoirs of Adam Lang, the former Prime Minister of the UK. The project had originally been started by Lang’s aide, McAra, who mysteriously drowned while trying to leave Martha’s Vineyard.As the narrator moves into close quarters with Lang, his wife Ruth, and his assistant – and mistress — Amelia, he begins to sense that something is not quite right. Doubts grow about Lang’s rise to power, the truth behind his marriage, and the real circumstances of McAra’s death.Sharp, witty, and infused with astute British humour, the novel builds cleverly toward a final twist. A thoroughly enjoyable read.
“Kate had already let herself in and was watching the news. Kate: I had forgotten she was coming over for the evening. She was my – ? I never knew what to call her. To say she was my girlfriend was absurd; no one the wrong side of thirty has a girlfriend. Partner wasn’t right either, as we didn’t live under the same roof. Lover? How could one keep a straight face? Mistress? Do me a favor. Fiancée? Certainly not. I suppose I ought to have realized it was ominous that forty thousand years of human language had failed to produce a word for our relationship.”