1962

A newly-wed couple, Edward and Catherine, arrive to the hotel facing Chesil Beach to spend their honeymoon. They are young and they are about to consummate their marriage. She is nervous because she is a virgin and she is terrified by sex; he is nervous because he wants to last enough to give her pleasure and is not that experienced anyway. They are in this wedding suite; they listen to the sound of the radio newscast from downstairs - it's the years of the end of the end of colonialism, and Harold Macmillan is the Prime Minister - and they eat a dinner they are not hungry for. There is a lack of communication between them, but the reader will learn everything there is to know about these two vulgar characters in a separate part of the book.

There are pages and pages of awkwardness: this couple is really really awkward, although I could understand both of them. Both of them are products of their upbringing, education and social expectations. I would recommend it. It is a quick read but it is written with a high level of mastery over the material.

Released this Tuesday at 20:00.