AustLit

'Johnny grew up in lower-class London with a mother who was both a prostitute and a drug addict. When his mother dies of an overdose, seven-year-old Johnny is befriended by a handsome stranger, Shamash, who saw the incident unfold. Before the police can inquire, Shamash has comforted the boy and, with the complicity of the orphaned Johnny, whisked him back to Australia, in the place of Shamash's own, recently deceased, son.

'Johnny, now become "Vaslav," settles into a comfortable life as the son of a prominent gay man - well known in gay and arts circles alike. Well-loved and taken care of by his new family, Vaslav thinks his past is gone forever. But as he becomes a teenager, Vaslav begins to realize that "Johnny" is still there, deep within him, ready to spend the forbidden currencies of youth and sex in this new world of excess, parties, and pretty boys.

'With the seeds of his own ruin sown deep within him, Vaslav initiates a forbidden love affair, one that threatens to destroy him and all whom he knows and loves.' (Trove)