The Line of Beauty

Set in 1983, the novel follows Nick Guest, a twenty-year-old who takes an attic room in the Notting Hill house of the wealthy Fedden family. Gerald is an ambitious Tory MP, and with his wife Rachel and their children Toby and Catherine, the household draws Nick into a world of money and politics. Nick is innocent of both, yet he pursues his private obsession with beauty. Catherine becomes his friend and an uneasy responsibility. The book examines class, politics and sexuality in 1980s Britain.

Why You Should Read?

• Follow Nick Guest as he enters the Feddens' wealthy household and pursues his private obsession with beauty.
• Meet Catherine, whose friendship with Nick leaves him with an uneasy responsibility for her.
• Explore how class, politics and sexuality shape the novel's portrait of Britain during the 1980s.
• Understand Nick's longing for beauty and his sense of not truly belonging in the Feddens' world.

About the Author

Alan Hollinghurst is an English writer of novels, poetry, short stories and translations. Among his awards are the Somerset Maugham Award, given in 1989, and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, given in 1994. He received the Booker Prize in 2004 for The Line of Beauty. He is credited with helping gay-themed fiction reach the literary mainstream through seven novels since 1988.