"Redeeming Features" by Nicholas Haslam.  This is a great book for the first 70-80 pp before it degenerates into the most poorly-written chronicle of name-dropping and non-stop buttsecks I have ever read (and I've read plenty).  I'm sure many of you have slept with Haslam. I'm the only man in America who hasn't, it seems. In any event it starts out great with his fascinating mother (with whom none of you have slept), his bout of polio, Eton, the amazing Simon Fleet...and then starts to go south when, as is almost always the case, the Dook and Duchess enter the story.  By then it is unreadable. One example:

"Along narrow green lanes near Peacock Point were the astonishingly long gray stone walls enclosing scented azalea and camellia gardens, their closed gates signifying that the owner, Cecil Beaton's 'rock crystal goddess,' the aquamarine-eyed Mona Harrison Williams, was spending the spring in her rose-pink Capri villa."

I think this means she wasn't home.

Last edited by Sammy Ambrose (2011-05-25 03:08:50)

I have started reading Bruce Chatwin's (RIP) Patagonia. Having been there once I think it will be interesting as the forewward indicates he was a very unusual and highly educated individual.

Money by Martin Amis.

Last edited by Quay (2011-06-14 16:05:47)

^^ Keep going, it's a good one.  Then again, if you don't like his style, then it's a lost cause.

shoey - you'll have sprouts growing out of your ears soon..

I assume you mean sprouts as in seed/bean sprouts not sprouts as in those dreadful mini cabbage things

I agree that his architecture is an acquired taste.

I have a friend who spent 3 hours with him recently for an interview for a private publication for a financial house  - He's an extremely smart and fascinating guy. If it's possible, I'll post a link.

'Popular Romances of The West of England' by Hunt - about the lives of the giants and various witches, mermaids and so on.

"What Went Wrong?" Islamic scholar Bernard Lewis examines the decline of Muslim society.

Last edited by Marc Grayson (2011-06-17 08:56:13)