Author(s): Chris Womersley

Aust Fiction

1991. Fresh out of detox and five years after his involvement in the theft of Picasso's masterpiece The Weeping Woman from the NGV, Edward Degraves - art forger and drug addict - returns to Melbourne for a new start. All he needs to do is make one last visit to The Diplomat, a seedy motel renowned for its drug dealers and eccentrics.

But Edward's new-found sobriety is both a torment and a gift. As he revisits old haunts, he is confronted by reminders of the past: ruined relationships, a stalled career as an artist and - looming over everything - the death of his beloved wife Gertrude.

Shot through with grief and dark comedy, The Diplomat is a powerful story of love and recovery - and a stark evocation of the fine line between self-destruction and redemption.

Praise for The Diplomat

'This is a gem of a novel, full of all the good stuff - love, art, failure, heartbreak - told in a clear, strong voice brimming with loss and longing. A novel of propulsive storytelling and moving depth.' - Emily Bitto

'Art, addiction and nostalgia swirl in reveries that tie London to Melbourne to the Weeping Woman heist. Edward is so heartbreakingly lost in the everyday, so doomed, that he could have risen from Dostoyevsky. Dark, touching and deeply authentic, this is Womersley at his very best.' - Jock Serong

'Threw me right back into the grimy inner-city Melbourne streets of the early 90s. Wonderful!' - Favel Parrett

'Regret and grief are some bitter pills to try wash down. To write about them with raw tenderness, with all their savage complexity, is mighty. A harsh, brave and necessary addendum to Cairo. Bravo.' - Tim Rogers

'Written close to the bone. I clutched my pearls and then rooted for the protagonist. Both harrowing and wonderful.' - Kid Congo Powers (guitarist, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds)

MATILDA BOOKSHOP REVIEW

A companion piece to 2014’s wonderful Cairo, The Diplomat explores grief, art, regret, family and love all set against a tersely drawn backdrop of inner-city Melbourne in the nineties. A recovering heroin addict, Edward Degraves arrives back home, attempting to reconcile himself to the overdose of his wife in London. What follows is a tightly wound tale, without a word wasted, of attempted redemption. Womersley has an exceptional eye for detail, but it’s the empathy he evokes for the characters that makes this a memorable novel. GAVIN.