Restoration by Rose Tremain - Not only I, but the book-shirking husband read it on holiday...
Robert Merivel goes on a journey of experience in 17th Century England, choosing to court the court of King Charles II and on the way finds himself in love and out of love, in lust, and in lust again, with a variety of bawdy dames...
This is a colourful and tangibly authentic romp through tempestuous times - Politics, Plague and The Great Fire - as Robert contends with the dawning reality of his shallow self, finding truth and salvation through his growing selfless deeds and the King's laissez-majeste, finding his humanity and salvation along the way.
This is an often funny, post-apocalyptic paeon that has much of a message for our shallow, image-obsessed times, methinks.
