Shortlisted for the 1994 Booker Prize Edward Manners - thirty three and disaffected - escapes to a Flemish city in search of a new life. Almost at once he falls in love with seventeen-year-old Luc, and is introduced to the twilight world of the 1890s Belgian painter Edgard Orst. 'As is typical of the best classics, he has fashioned a universal tale of sexual obsession, love and death out of a particular life' Marie Claire 'An extraordinary book which takes the reader into a world of obsession and mystery...The Folding Star is lit by insight and humour' Evening Standard