Cambridge, 1994. Professor Don Lamb is a revered art historian, consumed by his work, but his academic brilliance belies a deep inexperience of life and love.

When an explosive piece of modern art is installed in his college, Don becomes obsessed with it, his anger culminating in a public outburst that results in his expulsion from the university. Confused and humiliated, he moves to London to take up a role at a museum. There he befriends Ben, a young artist who draws him into the anarchic art scene and the alluring nightlife of Soho.

Over the course of a long, hot summer, Don glimpses a liberating new existence. But his epiphany is also a reckoning, as his oldest friendship and his own unexamined past are revealed to him in a devastating new light.