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The book is about a group of what would have been dubbed ‘bright young things’ in the 1920s, aimless young people from the upper classes. They are about to set off to go to a party that’s taking place on the continent. It is a particularly foggy day and they never make it. They end up having a party in a hotel in Waterloo station. Around them in the station swirls the mass of people – the working classes – threatening to intrude into their lives. Henry Green was himself a bright young thing. He was educated at Eton and Oxford and a friend of the whole “Brideshead generation” but in this book he points out that the class system is changing and there won’t be a role for rich people who do nothing with their lives.