George Evans

In the novel George Evans, the title character and his friend Charles Fletcher both aspire to live the alluring life of an international banker in 1960s London. Told in the form of a conversation between George and another old friend, this novel recounts the dual quest of George and Charles. After the devaluation of sterling in 1967 and the boom in shipping created by the Arab-Israeli war, Thomson Guthrie decides it needs a shipping division, and appoints Charles and George to run it. Because Thomson Guthrie is an American bank, Charles is named head and George is his number two. Through love affairs, familial connections, and a changing banking industry, George and Charles remain friends. A. F. Gillotti is a former international banker with a deep knowledge of London and of English understatement and nuance. The dialogue is fast-paced and the scenes often humorous. But there is a more menacing undertone, revealing that betrayal is the currency of the modern age, and that life as a banker in London is no longer the glamorous life it once was.