The eye of the everlasting angel

the long version

A picaresque journey through the London of the 1960s, The Eye of the Everlasting Angel is Noel Virtue's fifth novel and his first work of fiction to be set in England. Young Toby Todd is abandoned by his parents and sets forth to try his luck in the big city. Unable to pay the rent, he is evicted from Calcutta Mansions by his ethnic landlord Mr Braithwaite and finds himself hungry and homeless until a chance meeting on Hampstead Heath leads to a change in his fortunes. The Eye of the Everlasting Angel is a modern fantasy peopled by an eccentric medley of characters: vagrant Lillian Pike and Olive Pinch; scheming Henry and Myra Wickham; prodigal, enigmatic Antony, who takes Toby to his first transvestite party. And ever hovering beside Toby's memory of his beloved Gran is the shining and watchful Angel.