Présentation de l'éditeur
Brooding, self-loathing Tom Cartwright is a modestly successful ghostwriter whose ability to spell correctly
and meet his deadlines has landed him the job of writing the autobiography of the wildly popular soap-opera star Georgina Nye. His imbibing, chain-smoking agent is swooning, and his offbeat, sweetly supportive live-in girlfriend of five years, Sara, is ecstatic—new carpets!
Yet even as he feverishly pens (read: mostly makes up) Georgina’s “straight-from-the-heart” life story (he’s thinking maybe a thoughtful, feminist angle), he is lusting for Georgina herself. Soon Tom—poor, misguided, painfully careening Tom—thinks he can have it all: a woman at home who loves him,
and a hot, panting affair with a television diva. With a little planning, can it
really be so hard?
In this clever, rollicking tale of sexual misadventures and the modern man, Mil Millington hilariously explores the sometimes foolish choices mere mortals can make when that certain chemistry forces us to think not with our heads or our hearts but with . . . well, things that usually lead us straight into serious trouble.
Extrait
one
“Table for McGregor?”
“Let me see . . . Ah, yes, just for two?”
Amy nodded and we were led through the restaurant to a table at the back, next to the toilets.
“I thought I’d better book,” she said as we sat down. “It can be tricky to get a seat in the smoking area at lunchtime.” I glanced around as I shuffled my chair in and saw that, apart from a squashed little ghetto of smokers at the tables around us, the restaurant was entirely empty. The waitress gave us a couple of menus, an ashtray, and a free, complimentary smile, and then turned to leave.
“Excuse me!” Amy called after her, arching back on her chair. “Could we have a bottle of red and a bottle of white, please?” She turned back towards me, questioningly. “Sorry—do you want anything?”
“No, I’m fine.”
“Just the two bottles, then,” she confirmed.
“Certainly,” replied the waitress, and headed towards the bar.
Amy scrambled a cigarette out of its packet, chopped her lighter aflame with her thumb, and pinched her face up with the effort of a long, determined draw. With a slight pop, she pulled the cigarette from her mouth and let her hands fall down to the table, at which point she stopped completely. She sat there, eyes unfocused, without breathing or moving—as though she’d simply switched off—for a tiny eternity. Even though I was used to her doing this, it still unnerved me and I was just about to reach over and investigatively poke her forehead with my finger when she finally relaxed and expelled the smoke with a noisy, swooping whoosh, like the valve on a pressure cooker releasing steam.
“So,” she said, “how are things?”
Amy was my agent.
“Oh . . . you know,” I replied.
Once Amy is your agent, there’s no going back. I don’t mean that in a bad way. I’m not suggesting that Amy’s contract specifies 10 percent of earnings and your immortal soul, or that trying to untangle yourself from Amy would mean her pursuing you, shrieking, through the night. I mean, well . . . I don’t have a dishwasher, but everyone I know who does says that you can happily go for most of your life without a dishwasher but, once you buy one, that’s it; life without one becomes unimaginable. Amy is like a dishwasher.
“I read the piece you did for Working Mother,” she said. “The ‘How to do your tax return’ thing.”
“Yeah. I just paraphrased the Inland Revenue’s booklet, really.”
“No, you’re selling yourself short again. The way you were struggling to run a small, ethnic-rug shop while raising four children with eczema? I really felt for you. And your husband . . .”
“Brian.”
“Aye, Brian—what a dickhead. I’m telling you, when you were filling in the section on provisional figures, I was there with you.”
“Thanks.”
“And Hugh’s really pleased with the way Only the Horizon is selling, by the way.”
This was the last book I’d ghosted. It was for a guy, Justin
