Published in November 2016, it tells the story of tubercular east London twins, Lenny and Miriam Lynskey, sent to convalesce in a post-World War II sanitorium in Kent shortly after the formation of the National Health Service (NHS).

[1] Eighteen-year-old twins Lenny and Miriam Lynskey initially enjoy life in post-World War II London, having spent an austere period in Wales as refugees.

Lenny plans to become involved in the criminal world of their Uncle Manny, a former black-marketeer who is now attempting to build a more legitimate property empire, whilst Miriam has gained employment in a respectable florist's shop in Mayfair.

Whereas such institutions previously only served well-to-do private patients, the recent advent of the NHS means that a wider section of British society is treated there for free.

However, Miriam and Lenny are rebellious patients from the outset, not least after they hear rumours of a miracle cure, streptomycin, which promises an alternative to the Gwendo's harsh surgical and cold air remedies.

Persky attempts to meet Miriam in Spain – where she is holidaying with Lenny, Valerie and other friends – but is caught stealing her a Paris gown belonging to a passenger of the cruise liner he is working on, and he is detained on board and returned to the US.

Her cast of characters is nothing less than a portrayal of post-war, class-riven Britain from the indolent aristocracy, to Oxford-educated blue stockings, and from car salesmen to the bottom of the pile, German émigrés and East End Jewish lowlifes."

Despite judging that, "Occasionally, the novel wears its social history too conspicuously on its sleeve: references to the early years of TV, issues with the middle classes, housing developments and debates about the NHS can at times feel pointed and do not fit entirely seamlessly with the narrative", Beckerman ended by writing, "But The Dark Circle is nonetheless a revealing insight: both funny and illuminating, it is a novel about what it means to treat people well, medically, emotionally and politically".