‘Barbara Pym is one of my most favourite novelists. Few other writers have given me more laughter and more pleasure’ - Jilly Cooper, author of The Thursday Murder Club

‘Life is cruel and we do terrible things to each other.’

The lives of Humphrey and James Boyce, a seasoned antique dealer and his good-looking nephew, are changed for ever when the elegant Leonora Eyre glides into their bustling Bond Street salesroom, delicate as porcelain, cool as ice. An impassioned bid lands her a coveted book and two equally enthralled companions.

As the enigmatic Leonora navigates these relationships, others are drawn into her mysterious and intoxicating web, and a world of human complexities and simmering desires is exposed.

Pym brings her unique voice to this darkly comic exploration of love, loneliness and jealousy.

‘I'm a huge fan of Barbara Pym’ - Richard Osman, author of The Thursday Murder Club

‘Faultless’ -The Guardian

‘Her characters are all meticulously impaled on the delicate pins of a wit that is as scrupulous as it is deadly’ - The Observer

‘A coldly funny book’ -The Sunday Telegraph

‘Highly distinctive . . . The critics who have recently insisted on Miss Pym’s too long neglected gifts have not been wrong’ - Financial Times