This roman a clef revolves around Victoria, barely twenty, who finds herself acting as amanuensis to Laurence, an elderly man of letters, now blind, who lives in a ravishing house by the sea in northern Italy. Soon after her arrival, she indulges in a heady night of passion with Edgar, a youthful Englishman. Edgar's mother, Lettice, who is jealous and suspicious of Victoria's prettiness and her ability to amuse Lettice's intellectual friends, decides to ensure that Victoria's new life back in England is a misery. Darkly funny and deeply insightful, Lettice & Victoria is not just a love story with a fanciful and flawed female protagonist, but a wonderful portrait of 1950s English society.