A middle-aged writer recalls his younger self. At 23, Nathan Zuckerman has had four stories published and a small, flattering Saturday Review up-and-coming-author profile (complete with a photo of him playing with his ex-girlfriend's cat), which he purports to scorn. As genuine and polite as he seems, Zuckerman has already hurt his family with his autobiographical art and ruined his relationship with adultery and honesty. Visiting his reclusive idol (famed for his "blend of sympathy and pitilessness") in the Berkshires, the writer watches himself watching himself and attempts to confront his work and life. Instead he finds himself turning reality into metafiction. A quote he happens upon from Henry James only complicates matters further: "We work in the dark--we do what we can--we give what we have.

The role of a ghostwriter is to make his client look good,not to uncover the truth. But what happens when the client is a major political figure, and the truth could change the course of history?

Adam Lang, the controversial former prime minister of Britain, is writing his memoirs. But his first ghostwriter dies under shocking circumstances, and his replacement--whose experience lies in portraying aging rock stars and film idols--knows little about Lang's inner circle. Flown to join Lang in a secure house on the remote shores of Martha's Vineyard in the depths of winter, cut off from everyone and everything he knows, he comes to realize he should never have taken the job.

It's not just his predecessor's mysterious death thathaunts him, but Adam Lang himself. Deep in Lang's past are buried shocking secrets.., secrets with the power to alter world politics.., secrets with the power to kill.