David Parker is adrift in a city that runs on self-belief. New to Los Angeles, and alienated by the brash voices, the bronzed bodies, the mayhem of traffic, he misses London and finds himself unable to work on his book. He’d say he had writer’s block if it weren’t just an RE course for fourteen-year-olds. To make matters worse, he feels he’s losing his wife, Rebecca, who is disturbingly eager to adapt to their new life.

After a party one night in the Hollywood Hills, David is drawn into an exotic circle of friends. Astrid, wanting to understand Islam from the inside, has bought herself a burka on eBay. Mo is developing a maverick style of film therapy. Natalie, sad and soulful, claims she could hide under water as a child. But then one night, while David watches, she slips under the treacherous waves on Malibu beach. Her death has him following a trail of videotapes that exposes secret connections and leads to temptations and consequences for which he is entirely unprepared.

The Male Gaze cuts through the clamour of broadcast media and the excesses of metropolitan culture to reflect on a world that seems to be spinning out of control. Written with poise, wit and clarity, it is a subtle exploration of intimacy and betrayal, of the fear of exposure and the forces of attraction, of what fragments us and what binds us together, and it marks the arrival of an assured and distinctive new voice.

‘Smart and funny . . . a unique persuasive voice. His is a name to watch.’ Time Out