THE FATAL ENGLISHMAN
Here, the acclaimed novelist succeeds in describing real-life stories of three men who died tragically young and who symbolize Britain's loss of both empire and idealism. Christopher Wood was a public school boy who was hailed as the greatest English artist since Augustus John. He eventually killed himself, still in his twenties. Richard Hillary was a privileged, handsome World War II fighter pilot, who died mysteriously in a training accident, also in his twenties. Jeremy Wolfenden was the cleverest boy in England, both brilliant and bored; he was a spy, an alcoholic, and openly gay in 1950s Britain. He died tragically in his thirties, under suspicious circumstances. These three men, like the country, grew up quickly, forcedly, and suffered from a sense of despair and disillusionment. Faulks once again succeeds in presenting a gripping tale of Britain struggling to mature over the course of the two world wars of this past century.