A New York Times Notable Book of the Year
A Time Magazine Best Book of the Year
An Esquire Best Book of Year

"Beautifully wrought . . . Brutally funny and sad."--Vanity Fair

The fifth novel in Edward St. Aubyn's stunning cycle about his protagonist Patrick Melrose. The last four novels in the cycle are available in The Patrick Melrose Novels.

Here, from the writer described by The Guardian as "our purest living prose stylist" and whom Alan Hollinghurst has called "the most...

A SCABROUSLY FUNNY AND FIERCELY INTELLIGENT SATIRE OF THE LITERARY WORLD FROM THE ACCLAIMED AUTHOR OF THE PATRICK MELROSE NOVELS

Edward St. Aubyn's Patrick Melrose novels were some of the most celebrated works of fiction of the past decade. Ecstatic praise came from a wide range of admirers, from literary superstars such as Zadie Smith, Francine Prose, Jeffrey Eugenides, and Michael Chabon to pop-culture icons such as Anthony Bourdain and January Jones. Now St. Aubyn returns with a hilariously smart send-up of a certain major British literary award.

The judges on the panel of...

A beautifully modulated novel that shows Edward St. Aubyn at his sparkling best

Charlie Fairburn, successful screenwriter, ex-husband, and absent father, has been given six months to live. He resolves to stake half his fortune on a couple of turns of the roulette wheel and, to his agent's disgust, to write a novel-about death. In the casino he meets his muse. Charlie grows as addicted to writing fiction as she is to gambling.

His novel is set on a train and involves a group of characters (familiar to readers of St. Aubyn's earlier work) who are locked in a debate about...