Screenwriter and failed actor Nat Fane is hoping that writing the screenplay for the film Eureka will rejuvenate his flagging career. The film is based on a Henry James short story, ‘The Figure in the Carpet’ in which an unnamed narrator meets his favourite author, Hugh Vereker, and becomes obsessed with finding a secret the author tells him runs through all his works, a secret no-one has yet discovered.

Nat is a larger-than-life character, a bon viveur with a taste for the finer things in life – being a member of the smartest clubs, driving a Rolls Royce and dressing in the latest fashions. When it comes to sex, Nat has a predilection for sado-masochism, resulting in him getting one of the best lines in the book. ‘He briefly wondered if his hostess would provide the necessary, and, deciding not to leave it to chance, packed two Venetian carnival masks and his riding crop.’ In addition, the poem Nat writes to celebrate his friend Freya’s birthday, inspired by the song ‘My Favourite Things’ from The Sound of Music, is both screamingly funny and very rude.

Those involved in the making of the film include avant-garde German director Reiner Werther Kloss, young actress Billie Cantrip (who Nat first came across in unusual circumstances), ageing actor Vere Summerville and Sonja Zertz, star of Riener’s most successful film. The book also features Nat’s friend, journalist Freya Wyley, the eponymous heroine of the author’s previous book. When Freya picks up the scent of a possible story, she embarks upon an investigation into potential murky goings on involving the film’s shady financier, Harold Pulver, as well as the mystery of what happened to Reiner’s previous film which was never released and has disappeared without trace.

As well as telling the story of the making of the film, each chapter includes an excerpt from Nat’s screenplay featuring the fictional characters he has created based on James’s story. There are plenty of parallels between the film and the book if you care to look for them; a series of ‘figures in the carpet’, if you like. A recurring theme of the book is the meaning of art in all its forms, or more precisely whether it’s necessary for it to have a meaning at all. As one character remarks, ‘Sometimes it is less important to understand than to feel…’

The author conjures up the atmosphere of 1960s London which is swinging in more than one sense. The era of sexual freedom and experimentation is under way and hedonism is certainly alive and well amongst the characters in the book, especially Nat. Drink, drugs, and more drink are consumed with reckless abandon with the proverbial ‘night cap’ often resulting in something more intimate. The songs of The Beatles form a sort of soundtrack to the book so listening to Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band would be the perfect accompaniment. Nat would probably recommend having a glass of champagne to hand as well… but only the finest vintage.

Eureka has been waiting patiently on my NetGalley shelf since 2017 – in fact, it was my oldest outstanding approval – and I’m so glad the NetGalley November reading challenge finally encouraged me to read it. It’s a lot of fun and just a little bit naughty. It’s also made me want to read some of the other books Anthony Quinn has written, both before and since.

This is a book for anyone with an interest in London in the sixties. I adored Quinn's earlier work Freya and found that this book was just as good. Quinn's writing style is easily readable and his characters have great complexities. We get to meet characters we wouldn't otherwise see in fiction, and I liked the pace of this novel.

London in the swinging sixties. Nat Fane is a playwright/screenwriter in his late 30s (having been a failed actor) who is struggling to replicate his initial great successes. He is commissioned to write a screenplay for an avant-garde German director, Reiner Werther Kloss, based on the Henry James short story The Figure in the Carpet. This story concerns a successful author who says there is a central, unified message in his oeuvre which no-one hitherto, certainly no critic, has been able to decode. Fane is rather an egotistic but charismatic bon viveur with an odd taste for sado-masochistic sex. Billie Cantrip is a young actress, somewhat unhappily attached to her stifling and failed artistic partner, Jeff. Fane had a minor part in Quinn’s previous novel Freya and the eponymous journalist Freya Wyley plays a sizeable role in the story. The core of the story relates to the making of the film, and the roles of the main characters, with Nat Fane as the central screenplay figure.
Interposed in the narrative is Nat Fane’s screenplay for The Figure in the Carpet. Although this may seem more of an indulgence by Quinn than an essential element of the plot, but it is absorbing and enjoyable accompaniment to the narrative as the film of the short story is made.
Quinn captures the feel, the milieu, the sensations of London in late 1960s spring and summer-time to perfection. There is a wistful nostalgic feeling to the narrative that makes one regret the irretrievable passing of such golden days and for London which has changed so much since then.

Everyone writing about London in the 1960s puts the women in Biba dresses, or features a trip to the iconic shop: but you can’t criticize them for that – it’s not a cliché, just a reflection of real life. It would be interesting to know when Biba was first mentioned in a contemporary novel of the 1960s. I had a quick look and couldn’t find anything that wasn’t from much later – but perhaps a Margaret Drabble novel might feature Biba?

This extract is typical of the book: it is well-written, interesting, carries the plot further – and also gives you plenty of anchors for the time and place, without shoving the research in your face. Quinn is very good on the clothes of his era…

This is the third in a loose trilogy: Curtain Call was set in the 1930s, then Freya took the story of some of the characters from the end of WW2 into the 1960s: now the story is picked up and moved on again. I’ve liked the series more and more as it goes on – I thought Curtain Call didn’t need the murder plot imposed on it (and I wasn’t convinced by the clothes - see the blogpost). But I loved Freya, and then this one even more, and hope there will be more.

The publisher’s blurb says ‘Sexy, funny, nasty, Eureka probes the dark side of creativity, the elusiveness of art and the torment of love’ and that’s a fair description. The characters are very rounded, and the book is entertaining and funny. It also contains a surprising amount of sex:
He briefly wondered if his hostess would provide the necessary, and, deciding not to leave it to chance, packed two Venetian carnival masks and his riding crop.
The framework of the novel is a film Nat is writing (called Eureka), a tale with Henry James (who is quite the blog favourite) and ‘the figure in the carpet’ at its heart. The shooting of the film allows Quinn to bring in a wide range of characters and settings: from respected British actor to young actress/waitress; from German avant-garde director to East End gangster. And there are plenty of parallels between the film and the book, and we can look for our own figure in the carpet.

It’s a solid satisfying read, and particularly enjoyable because it has such a wide range of ages in the major participants, the story is not at all confined to any one age group – or to any particular world or milieu. I have read a lot of books  set in the 1960s in recent years, and this is most definitely one of the very best.

I hope Anthony Quinn isn’t moving through the years too fast, and that there will be more of his history of the world…

Top picture is a Biba dress, second one shows David Hemmings taking his photos of the vivid dolly birds in Blow Up.

Summer 1967 and German director Reiner Werner Kloss is in London to shoot an updated version of a Henry James story. The production is financed by alleged gangster Harry Pulver, the lead actress is discovered after she tries to steal a wallet and screenwriter Nat has an interesting sexual peccadillo. This is the summer of Sergeant Pepper and amidst a whirl of sex and drugs and charges to society the film was never going to be a straightforward costume drama but as art and real-life collide the characters all change in one way or another.

Anthony Quinn is fast establishing himself as a stellar novelist. Yet again this book manages to be literary, emotive and entertaining and the twists of the plot echo those in the original Henry James novella. This is a supremely engaging book which offers much social commentary on society in the 1960s, and in that as well it echoes the writing of James. It would be too easy to think of this book as a story about a film being made in Swinging London, it is so much more.

Eureka is Anthony Quinn's latest novel. It is part of a loose series of books starting with Curtain Call then Freya and now Eureka involving characters who have appeared in the earlier titles. This time the focus is : Nat Fane and to a lesser extent, Freya Wyley. Nat is a famous playwright tasked with turning a Henry James short Story into a film script and follows his struggle to capture various themes. some of these cross over from the film to the book: jealousy, anger, the meaning of art.
The book is set in the height of the 1960s. the Beatles have just released Sgt Pepper and London is swinging, the boundaries of behaviour are increasingly being pushed and the author captures this hedonistic sense.
There would be plenty to discuss in this novel for a book group as the author has developed well rounded believable characters who aren't always likeable. The discussion around the meaning of art - should it always be explained or should it be left up tot he individual to make senses of music, a piece of writing, a painting without it all having to be explained and dissected to the nth degree would make for a lively debate.

I received a copy of this via NetGalley in exchange for my honest opinion.

Eureka is an interesting book, especially for those who enjoy the 60's era. There are many pop culture references throughout the book.

The characters are definitely the highlight of the story. They are unique, interesting and developed well.

It took me a little while to get into the story but I did enjoy it overall.

This is a dense novel who sense of time and place is perfect .

The novel initially reminded me of London Blues by Anthony Frewin , but has a wider range and the occasional printing of the script during the book gives the reader an insight into the truth of the story you are reading.

What it didnt do for me is grip me , when i read it i enjoyed it but i never rushed to pick it up and resume , for others this wont be a problem and the writers ability to create people and write honestly will be for most people enough

Eureka investigates an elusiveness about art whilst also being a Sixties caper. It follows the making of a new film by German director Reiner Werther Kloss: a very loose adaptation of a Henry James story being written by man-about-town screenwriter Nat Fane, a man who likes an exciting life more than getting work done. The film features fledgling actress Billie Cantrip, whose introduction to the world of cinema is not quite as she expected, with mystery, acid trips, fire, and many, many secrets featuring as the film ‘Eureka’ is slowly made. The bustle of art, music, and gangsters in London in 1967 forms the backdrop for the book, which somehow balances the fun and danger of the period with meditations about obsession, artistic creation, and the hunt for real meaning.

Quinn gives all of the main characters extensive backgrounds and moves between focuses on them to weave together a long story, though the narrative doesn’t take place over more than a summer. Intercut between the chapters are snippets of the screenplay for the film that Fane is writing within the narrative, revealing the secrets of the film as the tension in the story rises. This technique gives good freedom for Quinn to counterpoint ideas about art and love in one story with another, and also to break up one narrative with another. This means that the book doesn’t feel as long as it might, and it stays gripping throughout with enjoyable characters and some surprisingly intriguing strands of plot.

As is discovered in the film being made, art should not give all the answers, and Quinn does not, giving his ending enough ambiguity to follow through with this message about the questioning of meaning. Eureka is a literary caper that delves into obsession with art and refuses to give definite answers to many of its major questions.