The Temporary

When one of corporate London’s transient typists unexpectedly crosses Ralph Loman’s path, her disruptive beauty ignites a brief blaze of excitement in his troubled heart. But Francine Snaith is ravenous for attention, driven by a thirst for conquest, and when Ralph tries politely to extricate himself he finds he is bound in chains of consequence from which it seems there is no escape. ‘Brilliantly perceptive . . . a ruthlessly honest dissection of modern sensibilities . . . It says much for her growing skills as a novelist that she is able to make something like a work of art out of her drawerful of our daily junk’ The Times ‘Breathtaking, fascinating and believable . . . The Temporary would be worth reading for its self-regarding, utterly thoughtless anti-heroine alone, yet Cusk’s interpretation of menial office existence and her understanding of its psychology is also piercing’ Financial Times ‘This is the story of a Julie Burchill heroine in a Julian Barnes world . . . Cusk has earned all her eulogies. She is a writer of great promise’ Literary Review ‘ “Temporary”, a category of both employment and lifestyle, is such an apt metaphor of Nineties existence that Cusk deserves special praise just for thinking of it . . . She writes with nervy precision about the vagaries of minor ambitions and desires’ Guardian ‘An exquisitely written gem of a book’ Vogue