City life during the financial crisis: Every house on Pepys Road in South London has witnessed much luck, love, and suffering. Through the lives of the residents of this more or less ordinary street, John Lanchester paints a highly relevant panorama of our present. All the residents of Pepys Road are in search of happiness: Roger Yount is a successful banker with two children and a spoiled wife. The fact that he does not receive the expected £1 million annual bonus plunges the family into a crisis. Next door, Senegalese football hopeful Freddy Kamo moves in with his father – will he achieve international success in a Premier League club? Petunia Howe lived on Pepys Road when it was still a simple working-class street. Pakistani kiosk owners are under suspicion of terrorism, while the Nigerian traffic warden without a work permit issues parking tickets.