"[4] The story is set in a castle owned by a cheese tycoon in Campania, Italy, where Keith Nearing, a 20-year-old English literature student; his girlfriend, Lily; and her friend, Scheherazade, are on holiday during the hot summer of 1970, the year that Amis says "something was changing in the world of men and women".

Originally set for release in late 2007, its publication was delayed to 2008, when he made what he describes as a "terrible decision" to abandon what he had written to that point, and begin again, building the story up from one section he retained, the part about Italy.

[7] Amis started writing the novel after the publication in 2003 of Yellow Dog to a hostile critical reception and muted commercial success.

In a 2006 interview with The Independent, he revealed that he had abandoned a novella, The Unknown Known, and instead continued to work on a follow-up full novel that he had started in 2003.

[12] The novel was published to mixed reviews, Eileen Battersby in The Irish Times calling it a "thumping disappointment", while Richard Bradford in The Spectator described it as a "unique, sometimes exquisite experience".