Left of the Bang - Claire Lowdon

Daringly, radically honest and very, very funny, this is the best novel yet about the ‘lost generation’ of young Londoners today.

Left of the bang: a military term for the build-up to an explosion.

For failing concert pianist Tamsin Jarvis, the pressure is mounting. She thought she was happy with her adoring schoolteacher boyfriend Callum, but when Chris comes into their lives, that starts to change. In a few months Chris will be gone, leaving for his first tour of Afghanistan. Nothing seems to be working out the way Tamsin wants it to – in fact, she’s not even sure what it is she wants.

With sharp, satirical humour, unparalleled social observation, extreme sexual honesty and great empathy, Claire Lowdon has captured the foibles, hopes and difficulties that characterise a strata of young London today. A funny, unflinching insider’s view on the generation born in the 1980s – who are often having much less fun than it seems – this is a Vanity Fair for our times.