Every August, barrister John Strickland leaves London for the annual holiday at his wife Clare's family home in Norfolk. This year, on a lazy summer's afternoon Strickland, reads something that changes his life for good. All that Strickland has accepted as the way things are, for good or bad, is turned on its head. In a few short months he turns from middle-class lawyer into socialist MP, from loving husband to adulterer and more. Until one of his more cruel mid-life fantasies is brought to life - and John Strickland finds that despite everything he is and always will be a married man.