It’s late spring 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 by the well-bred and intensely attractive Tesham – an ardent womanizer and ambitious politician.