The Line Of Beauty Hollinghurst, Alan

London: Picador, 2004 8vo., black publisher's boards lettered in silver along spine; unclipped photographic dust jacket (£16.99) featuring a black-and-white photograph of the author to the rear flap; blue endpapers; pp. [xii], 3-501, [i]; a fine copy, clean, tight and apparently unread; perhaps a touch compressed at foot; in near fine dust jacket. First edition, with full number-line 1-9, signed by the author in blue ink, and underlined, to the title page. Hollinghurst's Booker Prize-winning novel, which follows the protagonist, Nick Guest, and his relationship with the enigmatic Fedden family. Exploring themes of privilege, drug use, and hypocrisy, the novel was particularly notable for its exploration of homosexuality, set in the 1980s with the emerging AIDS crisis forming the backdrop to the book's conclusion.