Bücher von Ernest Pick

Paul Scudery, a 70-year old long-time actor in the soap, Babylon Revisited, has been playing the role of Ari Bloom for twenty years. He collapses and is admitted to a hospital where he learns that he has contracted a rare and incurable disease. The director of the soap has Paul record several scenes in which he is gradually phased out of the storyline. Paul collapses for the second time in a pool room. In a coma, he is flown to a clinic in France that offers an experimental drug, Cephylor. Awakening out of the coma in the clinic, he answers exclusively to Ari Bloom, the role he played for so many years. He has no idea who Paul Scudery is. In the clinic, Ari meets Penny, another patient, and they form a bond. Together, they attempt to forge a life together in the time remaining. Through dreams which Cephylor amplifies and prolongs, Ari learns of his life as Paul Scudery, a rather unsavory individual interested only in himself. But he also learns that Ari Bloom, if naïve, possesses decent and caring qualities. In a delirium, Ari passes after taking the train to Paris in his pajamas. Sadly, Penny flies to New York to view the final scenes Paul filmed representing his last days on the soap.

Poor Freddie Doolan! He still lives with his folks despite having graduated in film studies from a prestigious university. The great Director, Cephas Varte gives a lecture which Freddie attends. Afterwards, Freddie meets the Director who takes a liking to him and offers him a job on set, albeit a menial one. Freddie becomes entranced with Cephas and patterns himself after the Director both mentally and physically, buying elevator shoes, changing his hair shape and color, for example. The Director is flattered and brings Freddie along to Germany where he is shooting a new film. Freddie meets Lacey, a beautiful women and former drug addict, now Cephas's wife. Suspicious of Freddie, she guards the Director day and night.The film proceeds badly. Several disasters happen during the shoot. One day, Lacey accidentally runs over and kills a girl while driving in the countryside. She does not stop. In the cover-up, she sends Freddie with the vehicle to Frankfurt to have the front end repaired. There, an American named Billy, aware of the accident, tries to blackmail Cephas and Lacey. They devise a successful, if horrendous, plan to get rid of this nuisance. Out of guilt, Cephas lapses back into drugs.Now finding the situation unbearable, Freddie attempts to disengage from Cephas and Lacey. Can he do so? Can Cephas and Lacey escape jail?