Award-winning novelist Francesca Kay's new novel tells the story of aman who falls for the wrong woman. London. December 1981. The IRA is on the attack, acold war is being waged, another war is just over the horizon, and StephenDonaldson spends his days listening. When he first joined the Institute, he expected toencounter glamorous, high-risk espionage. Instead he gets the tape-recorded conversationsof ancient Communists and ineffectual revolutionaries?until the day he isassigned a new case: the ultra-secret PHOENIX, a suspected internal leak. Themonotony of Stephen's routine is broken, but it's not PHOENIX who captures hisimagination; it's the target's wife, Helen. Beset by isolation and loneliness,Stephen becomes dangerously obsessed with Helen, risking his job to keep hisfragile connection to her and inadvertently setting himself up for a fallthat will forever change his life. With compassion and tenderness and moments of unexpected humor, FrancescaKay charts the way in which imagination, projection, and desire overwhelm thepaucity of Stephen's life and identity. As beautiful as it is intense, The Long Roomexploresamind under pressure and the wilder cravings of the heart.
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