SEX AND VANITY by Kevin Kwan (Cornerstone £8.99, 368 pp) Nineteen-year-old Lucie Tang Churchill has been invited to the wedding of the year — a marriage between her childhood friend, Taiwanese heiress Issie Chiu, and an Italian aristocrat, Adolfo De Vecchi, on the island of Capri. The only downside is that Lucie is chaperoned by her cousin, Charlotte, who is nicknamed ‘Madame Buzzkill’. No sooner have they arrived than Charlotte is complaining vociferously about the lack of a sea view from their luxurious hotel rooms. She is overheard by a gloriously vulgar fellow guest, Rosemary Zao, who insists that Lucie and Charlotte take over her sea-view suites.