Gorsky

Vesna Goldsworthy

A rags to riches story set in London. Niki, a Serbian refugee book shop assistant, is employed by Gorsky, a Russian oligarch, to buy Gorsky's personal library. Atmospheric descriptions of the Chelsea and Knightsbridge districts and of the lavish lifestyle of the London super rich combine to deliver an entertaining novel with shades of 'The Great Gatsby'.

Extract

Gorsky changed my life. I remember his first visit to the shop. You couldn't fail to notice him, even in a city like London, in which millions are bent on attracting attention.
People walk around with exhibitionist swagger, as though starring in their own YouTube clip. He was quietly remarkable: foreign, expensive, somehow still even when he moved, his volume turned down permanently. His melancholy muzzle was equine and aristocratic, and his tailored worsteds so ripely English that at first I thought he could only be Prussian.

Parallels