Other People's Money

by Justin Cartwright

In a world still uneasy after the financial turmoil of 2008, Justin Cartwright puts a human face on the dishonesties and misdeeds of the bankers who imperiled us. Tubal and Co. is a small, privately owned bank in England. As the company's longtime leader, Sir Harry Tubal, slips into senility, his son Julian takes over the reins-and not all is well. The company's hedge fund now owns innumerable toxic assets, and Julian fears what will happen when their real value is discovered.

Artair Macleod, an actor manager whose ex-wife, Fleur, was all but stolen by Sir Harry, discovers that his company's monthly grant has not been paid by Tubal. Getting no answers from Julian, he goes to the local press, and an eager young reporter begins asking questions. Bit by bit, the reporter discovers that the grant money is in fact a payoff from Fleur, written off by the bank as a charitable donation, and a scandal breaks. Julian's temperament and judgment prove a bad fit for the economic forces of the era, and the family business plunges into chaos as he tries to hide the losses and massage the balance sheet.

A story both cautionary and uncomfortably familiar, Other People's Money is not a polemic but a tale of morality and hubris, with the Tubal family ultimately left searching only for closure. Bold, humane, urbane, full of rich characters, and effortlessly convincing, this is a novel that reminds us who we are and how we got ourselves here.

Genres: Fiction, Economics, Novels, Literary Fiction, Book Club, Contemporary, British Literature

259 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2011

About the author

Justin Cartwright (born 1945) is a British novelist.

He was born in South Africa, where his father was the editor of the Rand Daily Mail newspaper, and was educated there, in the United States and at Trinity College, Oxford. Cartwright has worked in advertising and has directed documentaries, films and television commercials. He managed election broadcasts, first for the Liberal Party and then the SDP-Liberal Alliance during the 1979, 1983 and 1987 British general elections. For his work on election broadcasts, Cartwright was appointed an MBE.

Cartwright had a wife, Penny, and two sons.

Reviews

[Fionnuala]

It was inevitable that someone would fictionalise the banking crisis and I looked forward to getting an inside track on hedge funds, bond holders, foreclosures, takeovers etc. But, while there's plenty of information in this well written novel on the privileged inside trackers of the banking world, I still don't understand what hedge funds are or how takeovers solve any problems.

[Jeffrey Keeten · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wasn't sure what to expect from this book. I thought there was a chance that I would read a few pages and chuck it on to the "some other time" pile, but Justin Cartwright, first of all, is a wonderful writer. The plot was crisply handled and the book was the perfect length at 258 pages. I like a writer to show restraint.

The characters are fleshed out nicely we are exposed to their weaknesses and their strengths as the novel progresses. Cartwright does not waste our time with stereotypical characters. If he brings a character to life he deftly fills in the shadows and light that make up a real human being.

Cartwright only delved into the shallow end of the huge banking crisis that is facing Julian Trevelyan-Tubal which I think was a great decision because getting into the technicalities of the issue would have weighed down the plot and certainly bloated the book unnecessarily.

I shouldn't like Julian because he is the British version of the type of privileged few that hold 90% of the wealth in this country. As I follow Julian in his trials and tribulations with trying to save an institution that has existed for eleven generations I start to feel sympathy for his situation. I start to root for him to win. The shell game that Julian is playing trying to sell the bank, hold off the press, and keep a lid on the precarious situation so that the public does not make a run on the bank (Julian wouldn't have done nearly as well as George Bailey in "It's a Wonderful Life").

"The money simply imploded. It no longer exists. Nobody can explain it." That pretty much explains the whole banking crisis that brought capitalism to it's knees.

[Vanya Prodanova · Rating 3 out of 5]

Не бях чела книга, която да е художествена интерпретация на финансовата криза от 2008, ама ето, че прочетох. Имам своите резервации за самата история и колко добре беше направена, но героите бяха доста реални или поне реално антипатични до един. :)

Остана ми лош привкус книгата. Няма да си крия. Изключваме, че в края историята беше сплескана набързо, сякаш не е знаел как да пресъздаде поведението, мислите и емоциите на героите си, но и трудно ми е да приема, че банкерите имат души. Съжалявам, но толкова книги и документални филми съм прочела и изгледала по темата, че няма вариант, в който да повярвам дори мъничко, че подобни мисли и емоции могат да минат през главата на богат наследствен задник. Някои теми е по-добре да останат да бъдат разказвани с факти, а не с фантазии. Няма как да нацелиш правилната нота, а и ако е нещо твърде познато и известно, наистина е трудно да пресъздадеш измислен свят, който да е поне малко believable.

[Kiwiflora · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the second book I have read by this South African born, London living author. I read 'To Heaven By Water' earlier in the year and enjoyed it very much. So when this one was put into book club, only published this year, I snapped it up. And it is even better than the first one I read. I have also found out via Google that this book has just won the Novel of the Year in the Spear's 3rd Annual Book Awards. Who might you ask is Spears? "Spear’s is the multi-award-winning wealth management and luxury lifestyle media brand whose flagship magazine has become a must-read for the ultra-high-net- worth (UHNW) community." (Taken from the Spear's website). So I find it both amusing and ironical that this novel which is essentially an attack on the international banking scene should receive such an award. Unless of course they are all trying to have a good old laugh at themselves. Maybe in light of events in the last 3 years or so, they need a good old laugh. The monied characters in this book, however, do take themselves and their lifestyles very seriously; I can't imagine them laughing at all at the predicament they find themselves in!

Julian Trevelyan-Tubal is, I think, the eleventh generation to be running the privately owned, 340 year old upper-crust banking institution that is known as Tubal and Co. Technically his father is still in charge. But Sir Harry has recently suffered a very serious stroke, is living at the family beach house in Antibes, and failing fast. Julian and his trusty lieutenant, Nigel, have in the past few years, and against Sir Harry's modus operandi, been investing and operating heavily in a variety of high risk hedge funds. With the collapse of the sub-prime mortgage and derivatives market, which was essentially gambling on price rises of ethereal, paper based assets, Tubal and Co is now in very big trouble. Julian and Nigel have come up with a way that floats somewhere between marginally legal/marginally illegal to save the bank - a rearrangement of figures. I still don't entirely know what exactly is legal or illegal about what they were doing - it seems to be something along the lines of borrowing off Peter to repay Paul, but this sort of fine detail has little bearing on the story or the enjoyment of reading it. I wonder if the author truly understands it himself as in his acknowledgements he writes "I have taken advice on banking and how it works, but I have decided not to name any of those I consulted". Very intriguing and amusing.

At the same time as these two gents are rebalancing the books, they are also trying to sell the bank to a large American bank. Julian's heart was never in becoming a banker, but he was forced to step up when years earlier the older son, Simon, simply refused to do it and ran off to Africa. As you do. In fact Simon is probably the only member of this family to have any sense at all, and although ridiculed within the family certainly has the sympathy and understanding of the reader. Naturally the family is unaware of the impending crisis. The only certainties are the impending death of Sir Harry and the purchase by the Americans, but at what price.

Meanwhile, in a small town in Cornwall, lives the ex-husband of Sir Harry's second wife Fleur. Since Fleur ran off with Sir Harry some 24 years prior, Artair Macleod has received a quarterly payment from one of the bank trusts. This is his prime income, and enables him to pursue his varied career as a playwright and producer/director of, amongst other things, Thomas the Tank Engine re runs for the local community. Suddenly one day, his quarterly payment is not in his bank account as expected and so begins the exposure of Tubal and Co's current financial situation. This occurs via the local newspaper whose aging editor lost his entire pension fund when working for Robert Maxwell and so has a particular hatred for those who mismanage other people's money.

The author does not appear to like the monied classes at all, taking a very dim view of the smallness and emptiness of their world, and exploitation of others for their own gain. To a certain extent the Trevelyan-Tubal family members and their hangers-on are caricatures, but nevertheless he writes in such a way that the reader does feel some empathy, only some mind you, to them. Fleur for example, came from nothing, and once Sir Harry dies, knows she will go back to nothing, but it will be a very rich nothing!

This is a terrific story, almost thriller like in its development and pace, but also a very wry social commentary. Much like Sebastian Faulkes' 'A Week in December' it can be seen as a parable of our times. Both entertaining and thought provoking, it does make me glad not to have been born into vast quantities of money and have to live in the gilded cage as a result. Just goes to show money cannot buy happiness, but does make for some jolly good stories. And for those who like Cornish pasties, you will be pleased to know that since this book was published earlier in the year, the European Commission finally granted "Protected Geographical Indication" (PGI) status to genuine Cornish pasties. Now you really do have to read the book to find out more.

[Nathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Economist suggested this book during its unfavorable review of John Lanchester's Capital. The story follows a prestigious British family dynasty whose bank is collapsing. They resort to fraud in order to keep it afloat. There are a few plotlines interwoven between the characters both inside and out of the family. The financial talk is in no way over-the-top, the reader can follow the details without much background knowledge.

Early in the story the reader meets Artair McLeod who is writing a movie/theater manuscript of Flann O'Brien's At-Swim-Two-Birds. The discussion of the book makes it apparent that Cartwright believes to be in the same league as O'Brien, overlaying this story with ASTB. Unfortunately the most apparent way he does this is by vocabulary - keep a dictionary close by (parturition, miscegenation, and farinaceous are a few examples), although the repetition of a few of the less odd words (conceit, futurity, and above all fastidious) inclines the reader to suggest that Carwright should have had a thesaurus by his side. Sadly the similarity between Cartwright and O'Brien go no further.

The plot is intriguing, and the scattered humorous asides are refreshing. The book sides up well with Coming Apart to serve as discussions on elitist society. Mostly its social commentary. Okay but not as good as I was hoping.

[Anneke Senden · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another easy read by Justin Cartwright. A solid plot and interesting characters all set within the the context of the financial world we live in today. The only disspointment for me was the hasty wrap up of the novel - after spending time unfolding the story and coming to terms with the characters I felt the story came to too much of an abrupt end.

[Cheryl · Rating 4 out of 5]

‘OPM!' It's the trader's shout of glee that greets a deal gone bad. It's other people's money when they screw up, but they are quick to shout "mine!" when the deal looks good.
It’s all about the money.
The story is told from shifting viewpoints. Julian is the scion of one of England’s wealthiest and oldest private banking families; his father is the stroked out dying Harry, “…the tenth generation of Tubals, chairman of this and that, philanthropist, lover of the ballet, driven around all his life in a huge Bentley – ends up a sea creature, brain dead, his hands flexing and unflexing, mouth opening and closing as though he is sieving the water for minute particles of plankton.” Only Harry’s long suffering secretary Estelle can understand him now, and she is the one that can translate his garbled speech. ““He has dried up. The old phrases have escaped in staccato fashion from inside his head and the supply is diminishing. She will tidy them up before sending them.”

She is also the only one who grieves for Harry. No one in his family cares for him, they think only of the impact of his death on the family business and finances and therefore how that will affect their own finances, status etc. His son Julian visits him in the hospital, and on leaving discusses his impending death with his right hand man Nigel. In four sentences he has done talking about him and then spends even more time talking about upcoming tennis game plans, and business-as-usual details. As if the death of his father is but one small minor detail in the larger canvas of dinner dates, tennis games, overseas travel, business deals, and oh by the way, funeral planning.

Harry and his family are portrayed as almost hapless victims of their own selfishness, hypocrisy, and lack of insight. Incapable of a view outside themselves. The old man’s much-younger trophy wife, ex-actress Fleur, struggles to feel some emotion about his terminal state. “She reaches for his hand; her heart, her little gingham actress sentimental dishonest heart, is full.” She’s not completely lacking in insight though. “Maybe she’s become Emma Bovary. She needs dramatic models to form a view of herself.” “She thinks her new skin revitalising cream at £130 a jar is giving her face a healthy glow. Its effect is a little like going for a walk in a bracing wind. She’s losing all sense of irony.”

Julian’s reckless and greedy dealings have mortally wounded his family’s bank, but so far the damage is hidden. He needs to get rid of the bank before his shonky business practices are discovered. He thinks that a successful sale will let him exit from his duplicitous hypocritical lifestyle. As if his slimy nature has been imposed upon him by the nature of his business. He doesn’t know he will never escape himself. Julian thinks the staff will be angry when they learn the bank will be sold. He is aware. But that’s it. He does not think beyond awareness. He does not think of the translation of the impact. Julian doesn’t seem to regard the staff as human. The doorman (doorperson?) Jade is “as happy as a Labrador”
Julian is slowly assuming his father’s characteristics. “And he also seems to be assuming his father’s immense charm now as if the supply has been bequested to him and he’s come into the legacy early.” He doesn’t have the moral fibre to play a different role. “Julian thinks that in order to succeed in business you need, like his father and like Cy, to have limited imagination. If you were aware of life’s possibilities would you really choose a path of endless problems, disappointments and treachery? Would you choose to wear white Gucci loafers without irony?”
The book is peppered with delicious lines like that.

There are other interesting characters, peripheral cling-ons of the family and the journalists who stumble upon the potentially staggeringly scandalous bank fraud. The first two thirds of the book were great, bouncing around the different characters and heading toward an explosive climax. But then the author curiously seems to run out of steam, and the wrap up seems a bit contrived and hurried, and it falls flat, dragging the rest of the story down with it. I’d give it a 3.5, but for the delightful lines like, “The voice at the other end sounds a little fractured as though drink and disappointment have lodged permanently in the vocal cords.” , I’m rounding it up instead of down.
(A fairly high Booker zipability index too! ( ;-) )

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

To be honest, when I started Other People's Money by Justin Cartwright, I wasn't sure that I was going to love it. The book came to me through the LibraryThing Early Reviewers Program, and when I got the notice I was getting it, I couldn't remember requesting it. It was a little slow going at first, but the story really draws you in. These aren't always very likable people, but you find yourself interested in them and wondering how things will turn out for them. Eventually, I found I did not want to put it down.

Sir Harry Trevelyan-Tubal has been the head of Tubal & Co., a small privately-owned bank in England, for decades. A stroke has left him weakened, unable to write, unable to speak clearly. His son, Julian, has taken over the bank. His wife, Fleur, is absent -- she can't bear to see him this way. He is cared for by his longtime secretary, Estelle, who is secretly in love with him:

"But when Harry's first wife, Eleanor, killed herself she had foolishly hoped that he might turn to her, Estelle. It was like something from Jane Austen: the plain governess who hopes her good qualities will win through with the master in the end. But he was arranging for Fleur, the twenty-five-year-old actress, to be cast in a play he was financing."

The bank is in trouble. Julian was suckered in, like so many financiers, and now the bank is sunk deep in worthless mortgages and complex financial instruments that he barely understands. His father always said he wanted to run a bank, not a casino, but his son gambled and lost. Now Julian will need some fancy footwork -- and shady dealing -- to keep the bank solvent.

The complication in all of this is playwright Artair MacLeod, Fleur's ex-husband. When they divorced, he was given a grant -- a quarterly stipend and a stern admonition to stay away from Fleur. That has worked well for MacLeod, until the money dries up. He's a character, one of my favorites, cobbling together a living out in the sticks from grants and speaking arrangements and children's theater productions of Thomas the Tank Engine. When the checks stop coming, MacLeod takes action.

I loved the writing in this book -- it pulled me in and kept me reading. I loved his descriptions of people and places:

"He couldn't wait to come back to Cornwall, where you could take a lungful of air which had travelled undisturbed from Nova Scotia, rather than one which had passed through the lungs of twenty wheezing cockneys on its way to yours."

The descriptions of the villa at Antibes, with its turtle doves and umbrella pines, its hushed servants and the view of the Mediterranean -- vivid and enticing. (Well, maybe not the servants, but definitely the turtle doves.) It's a peek inside a family that is shackled in many ways by its ridiculous wealth, by all the unwritten rules of their status and its obligations. They operate on a different plane than the people around them; it both insulates and isolates them.

You see the trainwreck coming, but there is no getting out of the way. I was particularly impressed with the wrap-up; I hate a book with a bad ending. Here, the storylines are wrapped up nicely, but not too tightly. Even in the train's path, people manage to salvage bits of their lives; some of them are even happy. All in all, a lovely, satisfying read.

[Jonathon Dyer · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve been a fan of Justin Cartwright for some years. Look at it This Way – my wife refers to it as the “Lion Book” for its abundant use of leonine imagery – was the first Cartwright I read, about twelve years ago. That and Other People’s Money share common territory, though where Look at it This Way was, among other things, a gentle satire of London’s City culture, the pointing out the excesses of those who sought to create prosperity out of futures trading and similarly ephemeral devices, the present volume describes the still settling debris of the Global Financial Crisis that threatened to bring the First World, with its reliance on the flow of capital and junkie’s dependence circulation of imagined wealth, to its knees.

Cartwright is a masterful storyteller; he doesn’t preach or teach, but lets the tale unfold through the eyes and voices of his characters. Rather than try to explain the inner workings of the financial sector, the author unveils the story of a relatively small, London-based, family-owned bank struggling to stay afloat long enough for its prospective American buyer to sign the deal. This means engaging in certain activities that would be considered by some to be in bad faith if not outright fraudulent.

As I mentioned, the story is told through the eyes of the characters. There is Julian Trevelyan-Tubal, the Chairman of Tubal & Co, who has masterminded the fraud after taking over the position when his father, Sir Harry, succumbed to a stroke. There’s Sir Harry’s much younger second wife, Fleur, who can’t bear to be around the ailing patriarch, consoling herself in the embrace of her personal trainer. There’s Artair MacCleod, Fleur’s former husband, the one-time actor and current theatre director of a small company in Cornwall who Sir Harry stole Fleur from in exchange for a stipend for life, which has suddenly dried up. And there’s Melinda, a blogger for a local Cornish paper, who “breaks” the story of MacCleod’s financial troubles; after linking Tubal & Co. to Artair’s impending bankruptcy (and the threat it posed to the Easter Wind in the Willows performance), is contacted by an anonymous source with information on underhand dealings at the bank.

What is remarkable is Cartwright’s ability to present the humanness of his characters in spite of their failings or downright un-likeability. Julian, who never wished to be a banker, is not a natural at illegal activities, and since the whole plan went into motion he has been dreaming most nights about a pony he had as a boy, who – in his dreams – talks to him, offering advice. Artair, a selfish old coot hitting eighty and living off donations of pies and pasties from a local baker, still harbouring grandiose visions of Hollywood success, punctuates his awfulness with genuine displays of concern and affection. Fleur carefully negotiates the shoals of her new life as a widow, and all the uncertainty that entails, with a touching apprehension and an uncompromising awareness of her own shortcomings. The reader can’t help but feel some measure of sympathy for nearly all of the players in the production.

[Mariano Hortal · Rating 4 out of 5]

"El dinero de los demás" de Justin Cartwright. "Cada vez más se da cuenta de que esta gente le ha tomado el pelo al resto de la humanidad con un timo gigantesco. Y que ahora han terminado por creerse sus propios mitos", con esta frase en boca de uno de los protagonistas del libro, el escritor describe la situación bancaria tan aplicable, desgraciadamente, al sentimiento que todos tenemos hoy en día en esta situación de crisis mundial galopante. Sin desvelar detalles de la trama en demasía, el libro trata sobre la crisis bancaria y los personajes que rodean la caída en especial de un barco británico privado (Tubal & Co) y las consecuencias que traerá a todos los niveles, desde periodistas que investigan la posible situación de fraude, pasando por un escritor que recibía financiación del banco hasta llegar la propia familia que lleva el banco a la muerte del patriarca. Para contarla, no recurre a un narrador omnisciente, sino más bien a un multinarrador, ya que alterna narradores entre los protagonistas del libro, lo bueno de esto es que los utiliza para expresar la situación de cada uno de ellos desde su punto de vista. El único que conoce toda la información según va leyendo es el lector. Esto es tremendamente enriquecedor, ya que se puede ver cómo incluso los banqueros no saben dónde se han metido guiados por una ambición desmedida. El libro relata todos los entresijos de la situación, con las trampas, fraudes, dinero fantasma,... elaborados por los poderes fácticos para seguir manteniendo la situación a pesar de la catástrofe y está espléndidamente narrado. Además aprovecha para hacer una sátira sin compasión de ellos. Si a eso añadimos la intertextualidad de la que hace gala el texto, con continuas referencias al gran Flann O'brien, Joyce, Dickens.. etc.. tenemos como resultado un libro tremendo, genial y aleccionador ("Ahora todo el país ansía la fama y el dinero fácil y el abandono de toda forma de contención. El dinero domina todas las vidas.") ("Es un ser extraño: una persona feliz. No está de moda ser tan incondicionalmente feliz. Hay que haber sufrido y luego ya puedes reconducir tu vida y así disfrutas de un poco de admiración personal que pasa por felicidad"). ¿Cuál es el foco de nuestra vida? Qué libro nos brinda la editorial Ático de los libros, tan necesario como imprescindible y más en estos tiempos oscuros.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

If I could, I would have given this 3.5 stars, for reasons I'll explain.

On the one hand, this is an elegantly written novel full of well-drawn and largely interesting characters. The plot revolves around the recession-driven problems of an old private bank in England, run by the Trevelyan-Tubal family. The patriarch, Harry, has had a stroke and is largely incapacitated at the family estate in the Antibes. His son Julian, now running the bank, must make hasty and barely legal arrangements to keep the bank from going under after a major hedge fund has collapsed.

Thrown into the mix are the patriarch's much younger ex-actress wife Fleur, her former husband, a grandiose actor now stranded in Cornwall, a provincial newspaper editor and his young protege, whose blog attracts an anonymous tipster with news of the bank's troubles, and the cagey New York banker who wants to buy the Trevelyan-Tubal empire.

At the level of the intertwined relationships and even of the tension over what will happen to the bank and its pending sale, Cartwright is impressive. It's easy to appreciate the graceful mastery he has achieved.

As a book that does anything to actually explain the financial meltdown in novelistic form, or to create a realistic banking chief in Julian Trevelyan-Tubal, the books is less successful. Possibly because he believed any technical financial details would doom his novel for fiction readers, we find out precious little about the bank's demise. And we are supposed to also believe that Julian is both the man who was aggressive enough to get the bank in trouble and yet also the kind of man who would think thoughts like "in his heart, he knew the Gaussian bell curve was nonsense and he knew credit swaps and diced mortgages were chimeras, but he did nothing about it because everybody said that there were huge amounts of money to be made." Just a bit too clueless for the role he's been given, for my taste.

So, applause for creating a novel of financial meltdown, but I'll sit on my hands for some of the character development.

[Popup-ch · Rating 5 out of 5]

Describes the financialisation of a bank, in the midst of the financial crisis, but seen from within the ruling family. It is fundamentally about the same subject as John Kays book with the same title - What Kay labels the transition from Gemeinschaft to Gesellschaft, i.e. from an interdependent collaborative long-term customer-serviceprovider relationship towards a short-term grab-all-you-can i'll-be-gone-and-you'll-be-gone mentality, and how this short-termism has unanticipated repercussions .
Here the transition is incorporated as a generational shift; when the old chairman suffers a debilitating stroke and subsequently dies, the new guard tries to hide the losses sustained throughout the subprime mortgage crisis, and related hedge-fund disasters. In the end the 'establishment' gives them a slap on the wrist, and life goes on.

[Corene · Rating 4 out of 5]

This novel deserves a much wider readership, and would make an excellent movie. Shifting points of view tell three intersecting stories: that of a venerable London bank, family owned and scrambling to cover up a hedge fund debacle, a delusional Cornish actor and theater company owner who depends on a yearly grant set up by the bank's patriarchal head, and a young reporter in the same Cornwall town, who receives an anonymous tip that could cause a national financial scandal. Rich in language, with vivid characterization and sprinkled with witticisms, my only disappointment is with the cover of the book which does nothing to evoke the story or tone of "Other People's Money." Highly recommended for book clubs.

[Michael Berman · Rating 3 out of 5]

I saw this book in the Economist's best books of 2011 list. I liked it, but didn't love it. I appreciated the way the author showed us how the character (the scion of a fabulously wealthy, long-established private bank in London) was caught up in the 2008 financial crisis, and ended up committing fraud (not a spoiler--it happens early in the book) to attempt to hide the bank's losses. As portrayed, he wasn't really a bad guy.

At the same time, I didn't particularly like, or even care about, any of the characters.

[David Ball · Rating 4 out of 5]

First book of 2015! First of many I hope. I think it probably deserves three and a half stars. It's clever, and mostly well written, with a decent and believable assortment of characters, but I don't think it will date very well - it's very much about a certain time and place, and I'm not sure the world need another book on finance set in 2008. But the twist sets this book a part: it's rare to get a morality tale where the baddies get away with so much. A sly, subversive book.

[Ilya · Rating 5 out of 5]

A totally engrossing, majorly entertaining book about, of all things, the financial crisis. Delightful to read. Both wry and also sympathetic towards human frailty. How come I'd never heard of Justin Cartwright before?

March 2025 - STILL SUPERB

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

a good book, well writen, and interesting characters. I did enjoy it very much.

[Tony Snyder · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely magnificent! The insights into the upper-class are keen. I couldn't stop reading...highly recommended!

[Norain · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the reason I very rarely DNF a book -- because what if after the point I give it up, it turns out to be much better?

To be fair, it wasn't horrible even from the beginning. It's just slow, and I suppose, if you don't have interest in the world of banking of finance, this book may be hard to get into. The setting uses the banking crisis of 2008 (Lehman Brothers, too big too fail, and all those) as its backdrop, but despite the strong financial theme of the story, its focus is more on the family drama.

And the people are just... horrible (but in a rather dull kind of way). It's hard to empathise with these mega rich people, and to feel bad about the personal and professional (for Julian specifically) struggles. To some extent, I suppose I did manage, but never wholly.

One character saved the story. Melissa, a junior reporter, struggling to make her way around in the publishing world, a sweet combination of intelligence and naivety. I love her personality and her everyday struggle, which feels the most relatable, and also her professional relationship with her editor, who acts as a mentor though it's in a more offhand way.

It isn't just the fact that Melissa and her editor work in the same field as me that make me like them a whole lot more than other characters. Or that they're representative of the more common people. Because if we talk about the more regular people, there are Estelle, Sir Harry's faithful assistant, and Artair, the playwright, the archetype of a tormented artist, whose grant, given by Sir Harry, was unceremoniously cut off without explanation. But Melissa's sunnier disposition just injects a lot of light into an otherwise rather dark story.

The story is about Julian, in charge of a three-hundred-year old family bank, who had made a horrible investment decision with the hedge fund he founded despite his father's reservation. He has been moving money from the family trust funds and charities, selling off assets, to cover up the big hole his loss has left. Also, he is trying to sell the bank to this even richer nouveau riche who wanted the old money aesthetic which came with Bank Tubal's prestige and legacy. Some window dressings are involved, to pretty up the financial records, so the rating agencies don't catch wind (lest the downgrading cause a bank run). All these maneuverings take place while Sir Harry, the patriarch of the family, is no longer in charge of both the bank and his mental facility (he has had a stroke).

The plot significantly ramps up at almost exactly halfway point when Sir Harry passes away. Perhaps, it would have been more exciting if the characters are the more vicious, scheming backbiter types a la Succession. As it is, I find that there isn't exactly any bad guy in the story. I may not like Julian and the other rich characters, and don't really sympathise with them, but I did somewhat care that they ended up in not so-bad places in the end.

So, as it is, I find the story much to my liking and I'm simply glad I didn't decide on skipping and skimming.

[Mattie]

I was pleasantly surprised by this novel, which I took off the shelves of the university library almost at random. It's purportedly about the banking crisis, and that certainly forms the lion's share of the plot; this somewhat put me off, as I don't understand money at all. When I read the phrase "hedge fund" all I can summon to mind is the image of a privet with banknotes sticking out of it. However, the novel turns out to really be less about banking than it is about the rich inner lives of its ensemble, and the uneasy co-habitation of capitalism and art. In many ways, the novel is really a meditation on the nature and importance of art, particularly in the figure of Artair MacCleod, probably my favourite of the novel's memorable cast. Washed-up Irish playwright, and proponent of literary modernism, Artair finds himself living in an old lifeboat station in Cornwall, eking out a living from staging the same children's shows year after year and from a kind of quasi-alimony from his ex-wife Fleur's subsequent banker husband Harry. He dreams of convincing Daniel Day-Lewis to star in his ambitious film (or maybe it's a play?) based on the life and ideas of Flann O'Brien. After Harry suffers a series of strokes which leave him debilitated, and Harry's son Julian takes over, Artair's "grant" is mysteriously cut off. Melissa, a recent philosophy graduate and ambitious young journalist-cum-blogger, enters the scene—and that's where things really start to go off the rails.

The ending is surprising and unexpectedly moving; the satire is pointed, but less interesting—at least to me—than the musings on the role of art and the promise of the afterlife. This is a novel of the banking crisis, but it's far more than that.

[Jayne Charles · Rating 5 out of 5]

Who knew high finance could be this funny? This book has been the best company these last couple of weeks, like carrying a witty friend around with me in my handbag. I have enjoyed all the novels I have read previously by Mr Cartwright but this is my favourite to date, full of astute observations, impressively drawn characters and humour which is often all the funnier for its deadpan delivery.

On one end of the plot is a private bank in danger of going under if the family who own it don’t sneak in some major funds while the FSA are looking the other way. On the other end is a small Cornish fishing town where Artair MacCleod, a self-important playwright, is subsisting on pies after his stipend is cut off (ouch). This is the unlikely catalyst that sets the local paper on the trail of the London fat cats with a story that could send the whole house of cards tumbling down. It’s a story of big economics and small individual lives and the author balances them beautifully.

There were bits that seemed as though the author, having created his characters, had decided to have a bit of fun with them and see what happened. In particular, the bit where society wives Kim and Fleur go out to organise a vegetable planting activity for unemployed youths and end up doing most of the work themselves while the youths smoke in the van. The plot would have stood without scenes like these, but I am so glad they were there. They added depth and pathos and balanced the economic stuff beautifully.

[Keen Reader · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 Stars!

“Yes it may be that the boss of Tubal’s has committed a fraud, but she wonders whether that’s so uncommon in the financial world. They all seem to have been guilty of a kind of fraud by pretending they knew what they were doing with other people’s money.”

This suffers from a bit of a sluggish start but Cartwright soon finds his stride and the writing really starts to get going and we get into some really meaty and satisfying territory. There is some lovely turned phrasing in here, with nice lines that respond well to repeated reading. The occasionally ornate language can veer close to overwrought, but it is in keeping with the mood and feel of the story and it does add weight and conviction to the bloated, arrogant, self-entitlement world of the banking industry.

“These privileged boys are never quite able to escape the silk ties that bind them.”

This book just keeps on building and by the second half it has developed into a highly convincing thriller that is hard to put down as it rushes to its exciting and well-crafted climax. This put me in mind of other great novels covering elements of the credit crunch, such as Jonathan Coe’s “Number 11”.

“The insistent belief that this money production is a superior form of activity and that those who deal in it are superior people. More and more he sees that these people have pulled a gigantic con trick on the rest of humanity. And now they believe their own myths.”

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm struggling to remember which book this was linked to as a recommendation, but the idea of an old-school bank being on the verge of collapse seemed appealing. However I never really felt gripped and there were too many strands for a relatively short novel.

I found the start very slow too, and reading about the living arrangements of an aging aristocrat in Provence just didn't captivate me. Things did improve, but I rarely felt transported into the scene, as though only the central characters were present even if it was set in a busy restaurant. Nor did I feel like I knew many of the protagonists except the more respectable son, with the remaining cast too simple or too peripheral.

The fact it was short is not necessarily a problem, but because there were many narrative threads, they weren't explored in sufficient depth, nor was there the crafted dialogue that could have animated the characters more, or humour that would have made the read more enjoyable. I did actually like the way it ended, and the plot was fine, but the writing to get there didn't really keep my attention and ultimately, I didn't really care what happened to the characters themselves, good or bad.

[Veronica Liew · Rating 3 out of 5]

A satirical takedown on the rich, self-interested and powerful people with their sly maneuvering to cover their asses during the most recent European financial crisis, and a funny take on the characters on the periphery who are affected by the main protagonists. Fun if you want to read some good writing in a lighter mode, taking on a heavy subject of old money, shady money and other people's money.

[Robert Burgon · Rating 5 out of 5]

A family bank in crisis, a young journalist looking to make her name, an author and theatre producer with delusions of fame and fortune and much more is in this thoroughly enjoyable book set against the background of the banking crisis of 2008/2009. Cartwright's prose is full of memorable sentences which are packed with meaning.

[Alice Persons · Rating 4 out of 5]

Marvelous book, lively and with welcome humor. He manages to interest me in a varied cast of characters and deal with some weighty subjects with a light touch, with no pretension. I will definitely seek out other books by Cartwright.

[Caroline · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another great book by a favorite author. Wonderfully drawn characters and a flowing story that makes the point... there are many beginnings and endings.

Huge extra points for a page at the end about the font, its creator and history.

[Liz Owen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Justin Cartwright writes well, and there are some interesting characters in this novel set in the days of the financial crash early this century.
It was quite a good read, but somehow it didn't really do it for me.

[Rahmah Hayati · Rating 2 out of 5]

I find it hard for myself to understand as it has a lot of terms in financial. However I do enjoy and understand some part of the book. I just can't help myself to finish this although I have read good reviews from other readers. I'm hoping I will be able to enjoy as they do.

[Joe · Rating 3 out of 5]

A nice and enjoyable novel, some comic moments with some very interesting characters. A good insight into a wealthy London banking family whose bank is in trouble. Well worth a read.