Booker Prize? Sheesh. OK, it's well written. But I found this to be fantastic rather than enlightening fiction, and the sense is strong that it wanted to be the latter. Fortunately, it was short - additional length would make it worse.

The story is about some old friends (in England) who've aged enough to have risen to prominences in their respective fields. They're facing some common-enough difficulties: early and possibly unsustainable success, clashes between public persona and darker personal desires, intelligent and capable adversaries, and baggage from earlier days. Not wanting to give away the end, I'll just say I didn't buy it.