A finely judged legal dilemma

WHAT may be the best first page of any novel this year announces The Children Act, Ian McEwan’s latest portrayal of the professional elites. To the neurosurgeon in the divisive Saturday (2005) and the Nobel-winning physicist of the satirical Solar (2010), McEwan adds Fiona Maye, a High Court judge with a reputation for bringing “reasonableness to hopeless situations”.

The childless, 59-year-old Fiona specialises in “vicious” disputes between husbands and wives, and in contentious child custody cases. The Children Act is set during one dramatic night. Fiona’s husband, Jack, a caricature of an aging academic who sees infidelity as an entitlement, has just announced his intention to pursue a “big, passionate affair”. Not to seek divorce, mind, merely to ‘purchase’ his pleasure with his wife’s misery.