num_pages: 443
description: Why do we fall in love with the people we do? Why do we visit our mistakes on our children? What makes life truly beautiful?Set in New England mainly and London partly, On Beauty concerns a pair of feuding families—the Belseys and the Kippses—and a clutch of doomed affairs. It puts low morals among high ideals and asks some searching questions about what life does to love. For the Belseys and the Kippses, the confusions—both personal and political—of our uncertain age are about to be brought close to home: right to the heart of family. 
language: English
title: On Beauty
titlecomplete: On Beauty
characters: Victoria Kipps, Howard Belsey, Jerome Belsey, Kiki Belsey
genres: Fiction, Family, British Literature, Literature, Adult, Novels, Contemporary, Adult Fiction, Literary Fiction, Race
ratings_count: 80297
places: New England, London, England
awards: awardedAt: 1104566400000
name: Booker Prize, awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: Orange Prize
category: Fiction, awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: Somerset Maugham Award, awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize
category: Comic Fiction, awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: Commonwealth Writers' Prize
category: Best Book in South Asia and Europe
publisher: Penguin UK