Writing is where you go to tell the truth, but it’s also a place of art. To reproduce what’s real simply isn’t good enough. From Hoi Polloi to Muck, this great memoirist has given us reason to embrace the blurred distinction between biography and fiction. It is unsurprising then that Sherborne has granted us a novel where its protagonist is writing his ‘testimony’ in secret from his wife for reasons he can only describe as a deep unhappiness. Yet this is no grievous account, but a trapeze act swinging between tragedy and farce.

Colin, a young Kiwi lad with ambition and swagger, escapes the Antipodes only to fall in love with an older Australian woman in London – Tilda. And so their European tryst sees them return home so giddy and drunk on themselves that they head to the Wimmera Plains with no other plan than to paint Van Gogh’s and have sex. Alas, the bite of bliss has sting in its tail and soon both are faced with the complexities of obligation and commitment. Simmering beneath are fizzled dreams and the sweet poison of desire.

What follows is an acute portrait of the collected wounds and humility in a relationship tested by age, illness and even deformity. Ideas about vanity and selfishness remain central to the book, and we are left wondering who of the two is more narcissistic. But this isn’t a question Colin seeks to answer. His story is more flawed as he decides who and what gains admission to this testimony. It’s apparent he is searching for a reason, an excuse, a meaning for love. Thus it’s an introspective novel, one that dives deep into the fissures of the soul, yet able to stop and laugh at the comedies of life.