The Sparsholt Affair

Alan Hollinghurst Picador €18.99

Unfolding over seven decades, and featuring a coterie of middle-class writers and painters, The Sparsholt Affair is pure Hollinghurst: a beautifully observed portrait of men and manners, with homosexuality at its core. When we first meet David Sparsholt, he is a charismatic student in wartime Oxford, an era of intense, unsatisfied yearnings, when scandal lurked in the wings. But times are changing, and David’s son Johnny, born into a more generous age, is able to savour freedoms that were once unimaginable. It is a touchingly upbeat tale and, as always with Hollinghurst, the dialogue is a joy.