Anatomy of a Scandal

by Sarah Vaughan

Overview

You want to believe your husband. She wants to destroy him.

“One of the season’s most buzzed-about thrillers.”—Bookish

“A strong choice for book clubs. Former political correspondent Vaughan makes an impressive debut with this savvy, propulsive courtroom drama.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“Vaughan offers gripping insight into a political scandal’s hidden machinations and the tension between justice and privilege…Absorbing, polished.”—Booklist (starred review)

“Skillfully interweaving the story of the unfolding scandal, Vaughan gradually reveals just how shockingly high the stakes are…Sinewy…engrossing, twist-filled.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

An astonishingly incisive and suspenseful novel about a scandal amongst Britain’s privileged elite and the women caught up in its wake.

Sophie’s husband James is a loving father, a handsome man, a charismatic and successful public figure. And yet he stands accused of a terrible crime. Sophie is convinced he is innocent and desperate to protect her precious family from the lies that threaten to rip them apart.

Kate is the lawyer hired to prosecute the case: an experienced professional who knows that the law is all about winning the argument. And yet Kate seeks the truth at all times. She is certain James is guilty and is determined he will pay for his crimes.

Who is right about James? Sophie or Kate? And is either of them informed by anything more than instinct and personal experience? Despite her privileged upbringing, Sophie is well aware that her beautiful life is not inviolable. She has known it since she and James were first lovers, at Oxford, and she witnessed how easily pleasure could tip into tragedy.

Most people would prefer not to try to understand what passes between a man and a woman when they are alone: alone in bed, alone in an embrace, alone in an elevator… Or alone in the moonlit courtyard of an Oxford college, where a girl once stood before a boy, heart pounding with excitement, then fear. Sophie never understood why her tutorial partner Holly left Oxford so abruptly. What would she think, if she knew the truth?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781501172182
Publisher:	Atria/Emily Bestler Books
Publication date:	01/23/2018
Sold by:	SIMON & SCHUSTER
Format:	eBook
Pages:	400
Sales rank:	3,757
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Sarah Vaughan read English at Oxford and went on to become a journalist. She spent eleven years at the Guardian as a news reporter, health correspondent, and political correspondent. She left to freelance and began writing fiction the week she turned forty. Her debut novel, The Art of Baking Blind, published by Hodder & Stoughton, St. Martin’s Press, and in seven other languages, was the result. The Farm at the Edge of the World was published in June 2016 and will be published in Germany and France. Sarah lives in Cambridge with her husband and two children.

Read an Excerpt

Sophie has never thought of her husband as a liar.
     She knows he dissembles, yes. That’s part of his job—a will­ingness to be economical with the truth. A prerequisite, even for a government minister.
     But she has never imagined he would lie to her. Or rather, that he might have a life she knows nothing about: a secret that could detonate beneath her lovingly maintained world and blow it apart forever.
     Watching him that Friday, as he leaves to take the children to school, she feels a stab of love so fierce she pauses on the stairs just to drink in the tableau of the three of them together. They are framed in the doorway, James turning to call good­bye, left arm raised in that politician’s wave she used to mock but which now seems second nature, right hand cradling Finn’s head. Their son—fringe falling in his eyes, socks bagging round his ankles—scuffs at the tiles, reluctant, as ever, to go. His elder sister, Emily, ducks through the doorway: age nine, determined not to be late.

“Well, bye, then,” her husband calls, and the autumn sun catches the top of his still-boyish crop, illuminating him with a halo, highlighting his six-foot-three frame.
     “Bye, Mum,” her daughter shouts, as she runs down the steps.
     “Bye, Mummy.” Finn, thrown by the change to his routine— his father taking them to school for once—juts out his bottom lip and flushes red.
     “Come on, little man.” James steers him through the door: competent, authoritative even, and she almost resents the fact that she still finds this attractive, commanding. Then he smiles down at his boy and his entire face softens. Finn is his weak spot. “You know you’ll enjoy it when you get there.”
     He slips his arm over his son’s shoulders and guides him down their neat, West London garden, with its sculpted bay trees standing like sentinels and its path fringed with lavender, away from her and out down the street.
     My family, she thinks, watching the perfect-looking trio go—her girl racing ahead to embrace the day, all skinny legs and swishing ponytail, her boy slipping his hand into his father’s and looking up at him with that unashamed adoration that comes with being six. The similarity between man and boy—for Finn is a miniaturized version of his father—only magnifies her love. I have a beautiful boy and a beautiful man, she thinks, as she watches James’s broad shoulders—a one-time rower’s shoulders—and waits, more in hope than expectation, for him to look back and smile at her, for she has never managed to grow immune to his charisma.

Of course he doesn’t and she watches as they slip out of sight. The most precious people in her world.

That world crumbles at 8:43 p.m. James is late. She should have known he would be. It is an alternate Friday: one in which he is holding a constituency meeting, deep in the Surrey countryside, in a brightly lit village hall.
     When he had first been elected, they had stayed there every weekend: decamping to a cold, damp cottage that had never quite felt like home, despite their extensive renovations. One election on, and it was a relief to give up the pretense that Thurlsdon was where they wanted to spend half their week. Lovely in the sum­mer months, yes, but bleak in winter, when she would stare out at the bare trees fringing their hamlet garden and try to placate their urban children, who wanted the bustle and distraction of their real, North Kensington home.
     They venture there once a month now, and James schleps down for a meeting in the intervening fortnight. Two hours on a Friday afternoon; he promised to leave by six.
     He has a driver now that he is junior minister and should have been back by seven thirty—traffic permitting. They are sup­posed to be going to friends’ for a kitchen supper. Well, she says friends. Matt Frisk is another junior minister—aggressively ambitious in a way that doesn’t sit well with their set, where success is understood as inevitable but naked ambition considered vulgar.

But he and Ellie are near neighbors and she couldn’t easily put them off again.
     Sophie had said they would be there by eight fifteen. It was ten past now, so where was he? The October evening crept against the sash windows: black softened by the glow of the street lamps, autumn stealing in. She loves this time of year. It reminds her of fresh starts, running through the leaves in Christ Church Meadows as a fresher, giddy at the thought of new worlds opening up to her. Since having children, it has been a time to nest; to cosset with log fires, roast chestnuts, take brisk, crisp walks, and make game casseroles. But now, the autumn night was taut with apprehension. Footsteps tottered down the pavement and a woman’s laugh rang out, flirtatious. A deeper voice murmured. Not James’s. The footsteps rose and fell, died away.
     She pressed redial. His mobile rang then clicked to voicemail. She jabbed the sleek face of her phone—rattled at her loss of cus­tomary self-control. Dread tightened her stomach and for a mo­ment she was back in the chill lodge of her Oxford college, the wind whistling through the quad, as she waited for the pay phone to ring. The look of sympathy from a college porter. The chill fear—so intense in that last week of her first summer term—that something still more terrible was about to happen. Age nineteen and willing him to call, even then.
     Eight fourteen. She tried again, hating herself for doing it. His phone clicked straight through to voicemail. She plucked at a piece of imaginary lint, rearranged her friendship bracelets, and glanced critically at her nails—neatly filed, unvarnished, unlike Ellie’s gleaming gelled slicks.
     Footsteps on the stairs. A child’s voice. “Is Daddy back?”
     “No, go back to bed.” Her tone came out harsher than she intended.
     Emily stared, one eyebrow raised.
     “Just climb back into bed, sweetheart,” she added, her voice softening as she chased her daughter up the stairs, heart quicken­ing as she turned the corner and bundled her under the covers. “You should be settling down, now. He won’t be long.”
     “Can he come and say goodnight when he gets in?” Emily pouted, impossibly pretty.
     “Well, we’re going out, but if you’re still awake . . .”
     “I will be.” Her daughter’s determination—the set of her jaw, the implacable self-belief—marked her out as her father’s daugh­ter.
     “Then I’m sure he’ll come up.”
     Sophie gave her a quick peck on the forehead, to curb further arguments, and tucked the duvet around her. “I don’t want you out of bed again, though. Understand? Cristina’s babysitting just like normal. I’ll send Daddy up when he gets back.”

Eight seventeen. She forced herself not to ring his number. She has never been the sort of wife who behaves like a stalker, but there was something about this complete silence that chilled her. It just wasn’t like him. She imagined him stuck on the M25, working his way through his papers in the back of his car. He would call, text, send an email, not leave her waiting—the au pair hanging around the kitchen, keen for them to disap­pear so that she can curl up on the sofa and have the house to herself; Sophie’s carefully touched-up face becoming a little less perfect; the flowers bought for the Frisks wilting in their wrap­ping on the table in the hall.

Eight twenty-one. She would call the Frisks at half past. But that deadline came and still she didn’t ring. Eight thirty-five, thirty-six, thirty-seven. Aware that it was bad form to do so, at eight forty she sent Ellie Frisk a brief, apologetic text explain­ing that something had cropped up in the constituency and they were terribly sorry but they wouldn’t be able to make it, after all.
     The Times had a piece on the Islamic State by Will Stanhope but the words of her old college contemporary washed over her. It might as well be a story about dinosaur astronauts, read to Finn, to the extent to which it engaged her. Every part of her was attuned to one thing.
     And there it is. The sound of his key in the door. A scrape and then a hiss as the heavy oak eases open. The sound of his footsteps: slower than normal, not his usual brisk, assertive tread. Then the thud of his red box being put down, the weight of responsibility abandoned for a while—as glorious a sound, on a Friday night, as the slosh of dry white wine being poured from a bottle. The jangle of keys on the hall table. And then silence again.

“James?” She comes into the hall.
     His beautiful face is grey, his smile taut and not reaching his eyes, where his light crow’s feet seemed deeper than usual.
     “You’d better cancel the Frisks.”
     “I have done.”
     He shrugs off his coat and hangs it up carefully, averting his face.
     She pauses then slips her arms around his waist—his honed waist that deepens to form a V, like the trunk of a sapling that burgeons outwards—but he reaches back and gently eases them away.
     “James?” The cold in the pit of her stomach flares.
     “Is Cristina here?”
     “Yes.”
     “Well, send her to her room, will you? We need to talk in private.”
     “Right.” Her heart flutters as she hears her voice come out clipped.
     He gives her another tight smile, and a note of impatience creeps into his voice, as if she is a disobliging child, or perhaps, a tardy civil servant. “Can you do it now, please, Sophie?”
     She stares back at him, not recognizing his mood—so differ­ent to what she had expected.
     He massages his forehead with firm, long fingers, and his green eyes close briefly, the lashes—disarmingly long—kissing his cheeks. Then, his eyes flash open, and the look he gives her is the one Finn gives when he is trying to preempt a telling off and plead forgiveness. It’s the look James gave her twenty-three years ago be­fore confessing to the crisis that had threatened to overwhelm him, that had caused them to split up, that still sometimes causes her to shiver, and that she fears is about to rear its head again.

“I’m sorry, Soph. So sorry.” And it is as if he is carrying not just the weight of his job—undersecretary of state for countering extremism—but responsibility for the entire government.
     “I’ve fucked up big time.”

Her name was Olivia Lytton—though Sophie had always just thought of her as James’s parliamentary researcher—five foot ten, twenty-eight, blonde, well connected, confident, ambitious.
     “I expect she’ll be dubbed the blonde bombshell.” She tries for acerbic, but her voice just comes out as shrill.
     The affair had been going on for five months, and he had broken it off a week ago, just after the party conference.
     “It meant nothing,” James says, head in hands, no pretense that he is anything other than penitent. He leans back, wrinkling his nose as he trots out another cliché. “It was just sex, and I was flattered.”
     She swallows, rage pushing against her chest, barely contain-able. “Well, that’s OK then.”
     His eyes darken as he takes in her pain.
     “There was nothing wrong with that part of us. You know that.” He can usually read her so clearly: a skill honed over two decades, one of the things that binds them so closely. “I just made a foolish mistake.”

She waits, poised on the sofa opposite, for her anger to subside sufficiently for her to speak civilly, or for him to bridge the distance between them. To reach out a tentative hand, or at least offer a smile.
     But he is rooted there: head bowed, elbows on knees, fin­gers touching as if in prayer. At first, she despises this show of sanctimony—a Blairite trope, the penitent politician—and then she softens as his shoulders shake, just the once, not with a sob but with a sigh. For a moment, she sees her mother as her charm­ing, rakish father confessed to yet another “indiscretion.” Ginny’s dry resignation, and then the quickly suppressed flash of pain in her marine-blue eyes.
     Perhaps this is what all husbands do? Sorrow surges, then anger. It shouldn’t be like this. Their marriage is different. Founded on love and trust and a sex life that she does her very best to maintain.
     She has made compromises in her life, and God knows, she took a huge leap of faith when they got back together. But the one certainty was that their relationship is solid. Her vision be­gins to blur, her gaze filming with tears. He looks up and catches her eye—and she wishes he hadn’t.
     “There’s something else,” he says.

Of course he wouldn’t confess to an affair without a reason.
     “Is she pregnant?” The words—ugly but necessary—discolor the space between them.
     “No, of course not.”

She feels herself relax a little. No half-sibling for Emily and Finn. No proof of a liaison. No need to share him in any other way.
     And then he looks up with a grimace. Her nails bite into her palm in sharp crescents, and she sees that her knuckles are ivory pearls thrusting through the red of her skin.
     What could be worse than some other woman having his child, or perhaps choosing to abort his child? Other people knowing. The affair, a particularly juicy piece of gossip, dropped into the ear of a favored few in the Commons tea rooms until it becomes general knowledge. Who knows? His colleagues? The PM? Other MPs’ wives? What about Ellie? She imagines Ellie’s silly, plump face alight with barely suppressed pity. Perhaps she already knows and recognized her lie of a text.
     Sophie forces herself to breathe deeply. They can deal with this; move beyond it. They have experienced far worse, haven’t they? There is no crime in having a quick fling. It can be brushed over, quickly forgotten, absorbed. And then James says something that takes this to a more damaging, corrosive level that strikes her in the solar plexus hard as she contemplates a scenario so terrible that, fool that she is, she hadn’t quite seen coming.
     “The story’s about to break.”

Reading Group Guide

This reading group guide for Anatomy of a Scandal includes an introduction, discussion questions, and ideas for enhancing your book club. The suggested questions are intended to help your reading group find new and interesting angles and topics for your discussion. We hope that these ideas will enrich your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book.

Introduction

An astonishingly incisive and suspenseful novel about a scandal amongst Britain’s privileged elite and the women caught up in its wake.

Sophie’s husband James is a loving father, a handsome man, and a charismatic and successful public figure. And yet he stands accused of a terrible crime. Sophie is convinced he is innocent and desperate to protect her precious family from the lies that threaten to rip them apart.

Kate is the lawyer hired to prosecute the case: an experienced professional who knows that the law is all about winning the argument. And yet Kate seeks the truth at all times. She is certain James is guilty and is determined he will pay for his crimes.

Who is right about James? Sophie or Kate? And is either of them informed by anything more than instinct and personal experience? Despite her privileged upbringing, Sophie is well aware that her beautiful life is not inviolable. She has known it since she and James were first lovers, at Oxford, and she witnessed how easily pleasure could tip into tragedy.

Most people would prefer not to try to understand what passes between lovers when they are alone: alone in bed, alone in an embrace, alone in an elevator . . . or alone in the moonlit courtyard of an Oxford college, where a girl once stood before a boy, heart pounding with excitement, then fear. Sophie never understood why her tutorial partner, Holly, left Oxford so abruptly. What would Sophie think if she knew the truth?

Topics & Questions for Discussion

1. One of the themes of Anatomy of a Scandal is what is seen versus what is hidden or secret. From the simplest element of Kate putting on her robe and wig versus wearing her “civilian” clothes, to the upright, clean-cut facade of James’s public persona versus his carefully concealed past, the major characters in the novel have secret sides of themselves. In what other ways does Sarah Vaughan emphasize the dual natures of characters and situations?

2. While at Oxford University, the characters live with many traditions and within ancient buildings full of history. How is the past interwoven into the characters’ lives? How do the settings add to the atmosphere and reflect the themes of the novel?

3. Why do you think Sarah chose to have Sophie and Holly study English? How do they use their education as adults?

4. On page 112, Sophie thinks to herself, “she imagined a veneer of serenity encasing her, a hard impenetrable polish.” What does this tell you about Sophie as a character? When and how do you see this hard shell protecting her during the novel? Do you think it also harms her?

5. What does Holly’s physical transformation communicate about her emotions and internal life? What physical elements of Holly remain in her new identity as Kate?

6. When Kate sees Olivia testifying for the first time, she thinks, “She is about to reveal herself as emphatically as if she were cut to the bone” (p. 123). How does the trial reveal character traits? What subtle traits does Sarah imply through the characters’ testimonies and actions in court rather than tell us in the more explicit narration?

7. Each woman in the novel is confronted with a series of choices. Which choices do the women feel they must make? Do you think they had other options than the ones they went with?

8. When Sophie confronts James after the court has found him not guilty of raping Olivia, saying she knows that he didn’t tell the whole truth to the jury, he responds, “I told the truth, near enough. Or the truth as I saw it. . . . We all adjust the truth from time to time” (p. 312). As a group, discuss the small and large ways in which the various characters adjust the truth throughout the novel.

9. What was the impact on you as readers of realizing Kate wasn’t a reliable narrator? Did it lessen your sympathy toward her?

10. Were you surprised by Sophie’s reaction to James’s admission of perjury (even if he wouldn’t define it as such)?

11. At the end of the novel, Brian tells Kate not to worry, that James won’t “get away with it this time” (p. 338). What do you think will happen to James? Will he be held accountable?

12. After finishing the book, read the epigraph from Hilary Mantel’s historical novel Bring Up the Bodies. Her book delves into the heart of Tudor history, exploring the dramatic trial of Anne Boleyn and her lovers for adultery and treason. The quote itself comes from Thomas Cromwell; many of the men he has accused of adultery are his political enemies. By citing a moment from history, what themes does Sarah’s epigraph emphasize in her book?

13. Sarah worked for many years as a journalist for leading British publications. In what ways can you see her journalistic background informing Anatomy of a Scandal?

14. If there were one more chapter in Anatomy of a Scandal, what do you imagine would happen in it?

Enhance Your Book Club

1. There are many portrayals of political scandals in the media. As a group, watch an episode of a television show such as The Good Wife, Scandal, or House of Cards and compare it to Anatomy of a Scandal. Are there similar techniques that the scriptwriters and Sarah Vaughan use to build suspense? What literary and visual symbols are employed to enhance the novel’s and shows’ themes?

2. If your book club has not already read Hilary Mantel’s Bring Up the Bodies, choose it for your next read and discuss the similarities in political scandals across the eras.

3. To learn more about Sarah Vaughan, read more about her other writings, and connect with her online, visit her official website at http://www.sarahvaughanauthor.com/.

Editorial Reviews

★ 10/02/2017
Cases don’t come much higher-profile than the potential career-maker assigned to driven British barrister Kate Woodcroft, QC: prosecuting golden boy junior Home Office minister James Whitehouse, the prime minister’s best friend since their boyhood at Eton, for raping the young parliamentary researcher with whom he recently ended a brief affair—in a lift at the House of Commons, no less. But the focus isn’t simply the he said–she said courtroom fencing match, but deeper truths about the nature of privilege and power. Skillfully interweaving the story of the unfolding scandal with James’s and his wife Sophie’s student days at Oxford—as well the drug-fueled, swept-under-the-carpet tragedy there that has informed his relationship with the PM ever since—Vaughan gradually reveals just how shockingly high the stakes are. Such is the strength of this sinewy novel from Vaughan (The Farm at the Edge of the World) that the glossy, tabloid-ready surface proves one of the less interesting facets of the engrossing, twist-filled tale that unspools. Agent: Lizzy Kremer, David Higham Associates (U.K.). (Dec.)

Publishers Weekly

"Sarah Vaughan writes about the heartbreaking consequences of sexual abuse and the abuse of power with real compassion as she takes us on a journey from modern day Westminster to 1990s Oxford University and back again."

Karin Salvaloggio

"Fascinating and suspenseful."

Bluestocking Reviews

"This is an extraordinarily written tale about power, prestige, and the skeletons in the closet. Highly recommended!"

"Dee"va with a Blog

"ANATOMY OF A SCANDAL is a stunningly compelling read—utterly gripping from the first page, beautifully written and expertly plotted. Vaughan brilliantly captures the cloistered world of Britain's elite, which is packed with suspicion, lies, and terrible betrayals. This book is a must-read for 2018—it's impossible to put down and will stay with you long afterwards."

Sarah J. Harris

Shocking. Compelling. Completely brilliant.

Eve Chase

"ANATOMY OF A SCANDAL is a compelling and cautionary story about how we can never truly know someone else; how even after twelve years of marriage, a wife might not know everything about her husband. Brilliant, shocking, and gripping, once I started, I couldn't stop reading."

Claire Fuller

I enjoyed ANATOMY OF A SCANDAL immensely – a very elegant dissection of a very messy affair. Loved it.

Louise Candlish

"This engrossing, masterfully crafted thriller is a story of money, abuse of power, revenge, and the pursuit of justice. This story feels like it has been ripped from the headlines."

5 Stars Goodreads

"Sarah Vaughan’s Anatomy of a Scandal is just that — a gradual unearthing of long-held secrets and betrayals, followed by a front-row seat for the lives that unravel as a result. Suspenseful and shocking, centered around an important moral issue that makes it especially intense, Anatomy of a Scandal is a nuanced, highly addictive read that resonates long after the final word."

Kimberly Belle

Sarah Vaughan is sensational.

Clare Mackintosh

"ANATOMY OF A SCANDAL is superb. Bitingly truthful, intelligent, gripping. All round class act."

Gilly Macmillan

"Moving between the present and the past, this is a timely thriller about marriage, but also about power, who wields it, and how that affects who we believe."

Stylist

"Deftly plotted and superbly well researched, with an eerie relevance to the current debate surrounding the attitudes to and experiences of women in Westminster, Hollywood, and beyond. An intelligent, absorbing page-turner that avoids all knee-jerk assumptions and easy answers."

Laura Barnett

I was hooked right from the start. So beautifully written, clever and compelling. I was gripped right up to the final page.

Claire Douglas

"A gripping dissection of deceit and desire . . . The definition of a page-turner."

Elizabeth Day

"It's that rare thing—a book that wholly merits the buzz it's been getting . . . a thoughtful if heartbreaking and, at times, hard-to-read exploration of the complexities of the emotions surrounding sexual violence."

Book Riot

"An eerily well-timed novel, Anatomy of a Scandal is an incisive examination of a rape accusation from the perspective of two different women."

Bustle

"I cared about both women—couldn't put it down . . . really, really, really, really good."

Marian Keyes

"This exhilarating novel . . . will have readers thinking about justice and truth and whether you can ever really, fully know someone."

Real Simple

"Sarah Vaughan drip feeds revelations while exploring the power and privilege of political elite."

Good Housekeeping

"Vaughan weaves together a juicy courtroom drama set among the British elite and told from the perspectives of three characters . . . Exceptional."

Entertainment Weekly

★ 2017-08-30
A handsome British politician—also the prime minister's oldest, closest friend—finds himself on trial for rape.Sophie Whitehouse adores her husband, James, a junior minister in the British Home Office. Watching him leave with their son and daughter one Friday morning, "she feels a stab of love so fierce she pauses on the stairs just to drink in the tableau of the three of them together." But James is uncharacteristically late coming home that night, arriving only to confess—in advance of the tabloid headlines—that he's had an affair with his assistant, Olivia. That would have been enough to shatter Sophie's world, but 11 days later, he's arrested; Olivia has filed charges of rape. James' trial brings together two formidable female barristers, one of them Kate Woodcroft, "a highly experienced specialist in prosecuting sexual crimes; forty-one years old; divorced; single; and childless," and for the defense, Angela Regan, just as determined to see James go free as Kate is to see him found guilty. And both women know this depends far less on the truth than on their adversarial and persuasive skills. As the trial proceeds, seen alternately from Kate's, Sophie's, and James' points of view, a second storyline unfolds in the early 1990s featuring a character named Holly. Holly is studying English at Oxford, as was Sophie; James is there, too, and his friend Tom, the future prime minister. All of them are involved in a nasty series of events that is not revealed until the end of the book. When the secrets finally come out, there are a few jarring details, but the momentum of the story thunders over them. Because the author leaves room for readers to consider for themselves the issues of consent and intent in rape, particularly in partner rape, this novel is a strong choice for book clubs. Former political correspondent Vaughan makes an impressive debut with this savvy, propulsive courtroom drama.

Kirkus Reviews