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Books

Fiction embroiled in the Profumo affair

William Nicholson entwines his compelling novel Reckless with the sex-and-spies scandal — but his prose gets clunky when describing real events

1 February 2014

9:00 AM

1 February 2014

9:00 AM

Reckless William Nicholson

Quercus, pp.504, £18.99, ISBN: 9781782066422

Sex, spies, aristocrats and atom bombs — the Profumo affair is in the news again, thanks to the recent Andrew Lloyd Webber musical about Stephen Ward. William Nicholson has chosen to hang his seventh novel around it in Reckless, which takes place between the end of the second world war and the Cuban missile crisis.

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Amanda Craig’s novels include A Vicious Circle, Love in Idleness and Hearts and Minds. Available from the Spectator Bookshop, £15.99. Tel: 08430 600033

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