It's here! Browse the 2024 Penguin Christmas gift guide
The Swimming-Pool Library

The Swimming-Pool Library

Summary

‘Deserves first prize in every category... Superbly written, wildly funny’ Daily Telegraph

THE BOOKER PRIZE WINNING AUTHOR OF THE LINE OF BEAUTY

Young, gay, William Beckwith spends his time, and his trust fund, idly cruising London for erotic encounters. When he saves the life of an elderly man in a public convenience an unlikely job opportunity presents itself - the man, Lord Nantwich, is seeking a biographer. Will agrees to take a look at Nantwich’s diaries. But in the story he unravels, a tragedy of twentieth-century gay repression, lurk bitter truths about Will’s own privileged existence.

Reviews

  • This bold and emotional story is a must-read
    Good Housekeeping UK

About the author

Alan Hollinghurst

Alan Hollinghurst was born in 1954. He is the author of one of the most highly praised first novels to appear in the 1980s, The Swimming-Pool Library, and was selected as one of the Best of Young British Novelists 1993. His second novel, The Folding Star, won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and was shortlisted for the 1994 Booker Prize. His novel The Line of Beauty won the Booker Prize in 2004. His most recent novel, The Sparsholt Affair, was published in 2017.
Learn More

Sign up to the Penguin Newsletter

For the latest books, recommendations, author interviews and more