{"product_id":"9780141036212-secondhand-the-birthday-present","title":"The Birthday Present","description":"A triumphant return to form - one of Barbara Vine's best novels to date\n\nIt's late spring of 1990 and a love affair is flourishing- between Ivor Tesham, a thirty-three year old rising star of Margaret Thatcher's Conservative government, and Hebe Furnal, a stunning North London housewife stuck in a dull marriage. What excitement Hebe lacks at home, however, is amply compensated for by the well-bred and intensely attractive Tesham - an ardent womanizer and ambitious politican. \n\nOn the eve of her twenty-eighth birthday, Tesham decides to give Hebe a present to remember- something far more memorable than, say, the costly string of pearls he's already lavished upon her. Involving a fashionable new practice known as 'adventure sex', a man arranges for his unsuspecting but otherwise willing girlfriend to be snatched from the street, bound and gagged, and delivered to him at a mutually agreed venue ... \n\nSet amidst an age of IRA bombings, the first Gulf War, and sleazy politics, The Birthday Present is the gripping story of a fall from grace, and of a man who carries within him all the hypocrisy, greed and self-obsession of a troubled era.","brand":"Secondhand Stock","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48420917641435,"sku":"9780141036212-SECONDHAND","price":10.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0523\/7646\/9701\/files\/4f5b873a-e186-40b6-af31-e2b825b47d36.jpg?v=1773749723","url":"https:\/\/bookgrocer.com\/products\/9780141036212-secondhand-the-birthday-present","provider":"Book Grocer","version":"1.0","type":"link"}