Nowhere is Lurie's authorial power more secure than in her depiction of Delia Delay, whose exuberant, self-regarding rhetoric and strategic flattery take the university by storm. With Botticelli hair (voluminous, gold-red, sprouting tendrils), grey eyes that match her "crumpled gray silk sheets", and luxurious clothes (velvety dark, glowing dusty pinks and reds), Delia is la belle dame sans merci: she entices with promises of sensuality and success, but actually steals and destroys. When she sets her sights on Alan, he does not have a chance. Jane is willing to forgive him, but Alan, believing the lies he tells himself, cannot accept this reprieve.

The consequences of truth are harder on some than on others. We don't know whether Jane and her new partner, Henry, will be happy, though we wish them well. We know Alan will never get what he wants from Delia, that his new success will not bring him happiness, nor keep at bay the demons of pain or disillusion. But there is no point in preaching. Lurie seems confident that people will go on telling lies, for these are embedded in human interaction, whether as lies of omission, distortion, or carefully fabricated falsehoods.

And, however adept we are at telling lies, Alison Lurie will be around to satisfy our need for fictional truth.