The Winter of Our Discontent

In the summer of 1983, twenty-year-old Nick Guest moves into an attic room in the Notting Hill home of the Feddens: conservative Member of Parliament Gerald, his wealthy wife Rachel, and their two children, Toby―whom Nick had idolized at Oxford―and Catherine, who is highly critical of her family’s assumptions and ambitions.

As the boom years of the eighties unfold, Nick, an innocent in the world of politics and money, finds his life altered by the rising fortunes of this glamorous family. His two vividly contrasting love affairs, one with a young black clerk and one with a Lebanese millionaire, dramatize the dangers and rewards of his own private pursuit of beauty, a pursuit as compelling to Nick as the desire for power and riches among his friends. Richly textured, emotionally charged, disarmingly comic, this is a major work by one of our finest writers.

Amy Scott-Simon, a young New York heiress, is engaged to marry Max Diamond, an older powerful real estate tycoon. At her bachelorette party, she runs into Jett, Max’s younger half-brother who is fresh back from Italy, where he is a successful male model. They have no idea who each other are. A one night fling leads to complications and regrets. Meanwhile, Chris Diamond — a hot L.A entertainment lawyer — flies into town to meet with his two brothers and Red Diamond, the boys’ dysfunctional billionaire father.