Larry Darrell is a young American in search of the absolute. The progress of
this spiritual odyssey involves him with some of Maugham's most brillant
characters - his fiancee Isabel, whose choice between love and wealth have
lifelong repercussions, and Elliot Templeton, her uncle, a classic expatriate
American snob. The most ambitious of Maugham's novels, this is also one in which
Maugham himself plays a considerable part as he wanders in and out of the story,
to observe his characters struggling with their fates.