A masterful new novel from the author of Peter Smart's Confessions and Gabriel's Lament, both shortlisted for the Booker Prize for Fiction.

'If Fred Astaire had been a novelist he'd have been Paul Bailey. This beautiful, moving novel is a piece of dazzling footwork and reveals Bailey once more as one of the wittiest, most panacheful and most graceful writers we have. I love this beautiful book' Ali Smith 'The warmest, funniest novel of the New Year' Mail on Sunday 'A masterpiece ... With the loss in 2010 of Dame Beryl Bainbridge, the mantle of Greatest Living Novelist now rests firmly on Paul Bailey's shoulders' Sunday Express 'A wonderfully elegant novel' The Times

Paul Bailey is an award-winning writer whose novels include At The Jerusalem, which won a Somerset Maugham Award and an Arts Council Writers' Award; Peter Smart's Confessions and Gabriel's Lament, both shortlisted for the Booker Prize for Fiction; Sugar Cane, a sequel to Gabriel's Lament, Kitty and Virgil and most recently, Uncle Rudolf. He is the recipient of the E. M. Forster Award and the George Orwell Memorial Award, and has also written and presented features for radio. Paul Bailey lives in London.