Present Times

At age 47, former playwright Frank Attercliffe lives with 2 of his 5 children in a 4-bedroom apartment on Walton Lane on the outskirts of an English suburb. For the past 3 years, his wife, Sheila, has been living with Maurice, a car dealer who owns a Rolls-Royce, a Bentley, and a Jaguar—a man rumored to have killed 3 people in car accidents.

Attercliffe cowrites a weekend football roundup for the local sports column, and after a match, he is introduced to the beautiful actress Phyllis Gardner at his favorite watering hole. That night, however, Sheila comes home, having left Maurice and given up her current lover, Gavin. She wants to move back to Walton Lane with the entire family—but she wants Attercliffe to move out.

With its cast of eccentric and endearing characters, including Attercliffe's loquacious fellow journalists, his alcoholic mentor, and the daughters who force him to live in the moment, Present Times is a novel about marriage, changing family values, and 2nd acts.