'Brilliance on every page' Samantha Harvey
'A revelatory novel' Sunday Times
'So brilliant and wise on chance, love, sex, money' David Nicholls
'How do I get out of a reading slump? This is the book to do that' Rhianna Dhillon, BBC Radio 4

Through chance, luck and choice, one man's life takes him from a modest apartment in Hungary to the elite society of London - in this captivating new novel about the forces that make and break our lives

Fifteen-year-old István lives with his mother in a quiet apartment complex in Hungary. New to the town and shy, he is unfamiliar with the social rituals at school and soon becomes isolated, with his neighbour - a married woman close to his mother's age - as his only companion. As these encounters shift into a clandestine relationship, István's life spirals out of control.

Years later, rising through the ranks from the army to the elite circles of London's super-rich, he navigates the twenty-first century's tides of money and power. Torn between love, intimacy, status, and wealth, his newfound riches threaten to undo him completely.

'So much searing insight into the way we live now' Observer

'Refreshing, illuminating and true' Financial Times

'Compelling and elegant, merciless and poignant' Tessa Hadley

'Utterly engrossing and I read it all in a day' 5* reader review

'I was hooked and tried to read this book with any spare moment that I had' 5* reader review

A 'Best Book of 2025' in the Guardian, Observer, Financial Times, Daily Telegraph and Daily Mail

• We started tracking this book on July 11, 2024.
• This book was £10.99 when we started tracking it.
• The price of this book has changed 4 times in the past 274 days.
• The current price of this book is £6.99 last checked 2 hours ago.
• The lowest price to date was £6.99 last reached on April 4, 2025.
• This book has been £6.99 one time since we started tracking it.
• The highest price to date was £11.00 last reached on July 16, 2024.
• This book has been £11.00 one time since we started tracking it.
• This book is currently at its lowest price since we started tracking it.

• Literature & FictionLiterary FictionPsychological
• Literature & FictionLiterary FictionLiterary
• Literature & FictionGenre FictionPsychological

• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
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• Print Length: 334 Pages
• File Size: 18 KB