Dissatisfied with her job as a pharmaceutical rep and
struggling with the decline of her long-term relationship, Grace, a
well-heeled Londoner, uses yoga class to unwind, reflect, and
momentarily transcend her earthly dilemmas. While pitching her
company’s latest antidepressant to the disarming Dr. James, she is
inspired by his plan to study Eastern medicine in Vietnam and
decides to quit her job to become a yoga teacher.
After studying at the eccentric White Lotus Foundation in
California, Grace returns to London, ready for her new life.
But nothing could have prepared her for the motley crew of students
she amasses--from the octogenarian industrialist desperate for
distraction, the supermodel who indulges yogic aspirations when she
tires of kabbalah, to the American film star who uses yoga classes
to conceal a scandalous affair. Overwhelmed, Grace soon finds
herself relying on her bi-continental correspondence with Dr. James
for solace and inspiration, his words hovering above her London
life like a sweet promise.
With an eye for the absurdity in every encounter, Alexandra Gray
gently skewers our society’s preference for a quick-fix nirvana in
this chronicle of one woman’s quest for love and meaning in a world
numbed by materialism and psychotropic drugs.