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[[Category:New Reviews|Lifestyle]]__NOTOC__ <!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Melissa Kite1454955546|title=Real Life: One Woman's Guide to Love, Men and Other Everyday Disasters|rating=4|genre=Autobiography|summary=We're used to thinking about career women who have it all: the high-flyer who goes home to her husband, children and immaculate house to plan their next holiday and their social life. We might not know these people - but everything seems to tell us that they're ''there''. What, though, of the single woman, no longer in the first flush of youth (that's probably nineteen, these days) who struggles just to keep going? What of the woman who struggles to keep the ''boiler'' going and who is tempted to kidnap the television repairman and tie him to the bed because she's convinced that the television will stop working the moment he goes?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780331916</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewSugarless|author=Siri Hustvedt|title=Living, Thinking, LookingNicole M Avena|rating=45
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary='Living, Thinking, Looking' is This isn't a collection of essays by Siri Hustvedt which, she claims, are linked by an abiding curiosity about what it means to be humandiet book. In these essays she examines who we are and how we got that way The last thing anyone needs is another diet book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444732633</amazonuk>}}''
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Mary Beard1635866847|title=All in a Don's DayThe Lavender Companion|author=Jessica Dunham and Terry Barlin Vesci|rating=4.5|genre=AutobiographyLifestyle|summary=Mary BeardIt's latest collectionstrange, the things that make you ''All in a Donimmediately'' feel that this is the book for you. Before I started reading ''The Lavender Companion's Day', of her assembled blog pieces from 2009 until I visited the end of 2011, covers similar concerns to her previous selection, [[Itauthor's A Don's Life by Mary Beard|It[https://www.pinelavenderfarm.com/ website] and there's a Don's Life]]. Professor Beard is picture of a fellow slice of Newnham College, Cambridge chocolate cake on the homepage. I don't eat cakes and became Classics Professor at there in 2004desserts - but I wanted that cake viscerally. She is also an expert (There's a recipe in Roman laughterthe book, an interest which she fully indulges in I'm avoiding with some difficulty!!) Then I started reading the pages book and I was told to make a mess of her TLS blogit. In her latest collection she bemoans Notes in the parlous current state of both Education and the Academy, and makes witty observations on matters as various as television chefs, what and how margins are sanctioned. You get to visit in Rome and fold down the art and worth corners of pages. You suspect that smears of completing references in an age when only positive things may butter would not be said about postgraduate job-seekersa problem. I ''loved'' this book already.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846685362</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Olga Levancuka0760381267|title=How to Be Selfish (and Other Uncomfortable Advice)Verdura: Living a Garden Life|author=Perla Sofia Curbelo-Santiago
|rating=3.5
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=It's strange how you come to read a particular book. A couple 'The most important part of days ago I was chatting to a dog-walking friend who retired about a year ago. He'd been surprised to find that garden is the main problem in retirement was one which he hadn't anticipated: all his life he'd had to account for himself to somebody else and now he was struggling to discover what who enjoys it was that ''he'' wanted to do. Then I found myself chatting to Olga Levancucka, author of ''How To Be Selfish'' - but she seemed like one of the most unselfish people I'd ever met. There was a book here waiting to be read!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1468115987</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Karen FrenchSarah Wilson|title=The Hidden Geometry of This One Wild and Precious Life: the path back to connection in a fractured world|rating=23.5|genre=Spirituality and ReligionLifestyle|summary=My favourite Mary Oliver line is the one in which she asks ''The Hidden Geometry of Life'' aims What is it you plan to explore the esoteric do with your one wild and often mystical meanings contained in precious life?''shapes and patterns [ I get to love that] represent ideas and distil the essence of realityline so much because my answer is ''. This mystical angle was a little bit of a unpleasant surprise for ! Precisely this reader. '' I should have had a better look at Karen French'm lucky enough to be living my one wild and precious life the way I want to. Sarah Wilson is equally lucky. In her book that takes Oliver's Amazon pages and previous work, but words as her title (though I was attracted by can't see that she acknowledges the source) she pushes us to think about whether we really ''are'' living the life we want – the best life that we could be living. Her answer is an exciting-sounding titleunequivocal ''no, we are not''. Don't care what you're doing, she thinks you (we, attractive cover and and references to authorI) could be doing more…And she's arteffing furious about the fact that we are not.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1780281080</amazonuk>1785633848
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Michael Neill1394159544|title=Feel Happy NowRecycling for Dummies|author=Sarah Winkler|rating=45
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=''Feel Happy Now'' is a dummy’s guide Recycling one ton of plastic can save up to happiness written by an NLP expert who Paul McKenna has dubbed 'The finest success coach in the world'16. What makes this book stand out, perhaps, is the way the complexity is done away with, and everything is broken down to an accessible level without being too patronizing. Its expert concepts presented in layman speak and the result is a highly readable and accessible book regardless 3 barrels of your belief in the subjectoil.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848504942</amazonuk>}}''
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Anita Anand, Julian Barnes, Bella Bathurst, Alan Bennett and others0760378134|title=The Library BookFirst-Time Gardener: Container Food Gardening|author=Pamela Farley|rating=4.5|genre=LifestyleHome and Family|summary=I had better begin by saying that I had a vested interest in liking this book since I am a chartered librarian myself and so am wholeheartedly in support of saving our nation's public libraries. But If you don't need ve ever thought how good it would be to be able to pop out into the garden and pick some fruit and vegetables for a librarian meal – but realised that you wouldn't know where to enjoy start, this is the bookyou need. It is rich with anecdotes 's comprehensive: you'll cover everything from some wonderful writers and makes a pleasant read whether why you should grow your own food, what you're keen going to save libraries or notgrow, what you'll grow it in (both containers and soil), where you'll put these containers, how you'll water and fertilise them and you finish the main part of the book with a handy section on troubleshooting. There's also a good glossary.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781250057</amazonuk> So, is it any good?
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Francesca Beauman1398508632|title=Shapely Ankle Preferr'd: A History of the Lonely Hearts AdvertisementThe Wilderness Cure|author=Mo Wilde
|rating=5
|genre=HistoryLifestyle|summary=You might think It had been on the Lonely Hearts ad cards for a trivial matterwhile but it was the week-long consumer binge which pushed Mo Wilde into beginning her year of eating only wild food. You might think it should appear The end of November, particularly in lower case and Central Scotland was perhaps not be capitalisedthe best time to start, but you'd be in disagreement with Ms Beaumana world where the normal sores had been exacerbated by climate change, who gives Brexit and a pandemic. Wilde had a few advantages: the area around her was a big L and known habitat with a big H to it every time she writes variety of it in terrains. She had electricity which allowed her survey of its historyto run a fridge, freezer and dehydrator. She had a car - and fuel. What's moreMost importantly, she gets had shelter: this was not a plan to write about a lot more than ''live'' wild just the contents of the adverts in this brilliant bookto live off its produce.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009951334X</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Roman KrznaricBjorn Natthiko Lindeblad, Caroline Bankeler, Navid Modiiri and Agnes Bromme (Translator)|title=The Wonderbox: Curious Histories of How to LiveI May Be Wrong
|rating=5
|genre=HistoryAutobiography|summary=When the Dalai Lama adds his words to your frontispiece, I'How should we live?m inclined to think it doesn' asks author Roman Krznarict really matter how the rest of the world responds to your book. To answer this ancient I know, having read the book in question, he looks to historythat Lindeblad would disagree with that thought. 'He knows (and at core so do I believe ) that it matters very much how the future rest of the art of living can be found by gazing into world responds to this book, because it tells the past', he says. Creating a book which truth as it is as full of curiosities as a Renaissance 'Wunderkammer', he has a stab at in the big questions: love, belief, money, family, death. The result is a pot-pourri of delights which left this particular reader stimulated and invigoratedearly 21st century.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846683939</amazonuk>1526644827
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Mikael Krogerus and Roman Tschappeler1732898731|title=The Question Boy Who Loved Boxes: A Children's Bookfor Adults|author=Michael Albanese
|rating=4.5
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=Most of us have There was a Boy who loved boxes. He had a box for everything and he was meticulous about storage: his parents probably made at least one of those end-of-couldn't believe their luck! It began with art supplies, stuffed toys and the-year lists of like: all the best books, albums and parties we things which most children have been to in the previous twelve monthsabundance. But can you, with some effort, locate The Boy's delight was in the one you sense of order in his room: it made in 1987? Have you ever constructed a graph of your ups him feel happy. As he grew up and downs in became a given periodMan, his life became more complicated and then decided to expand it he dealt with this by separating emotional, intellectual, sexual getting bigger and financial aspects and colour coding them? Have you made a list of all your lovers, bosses or friends and then rated them from 1 to 10 on several dimensions each? Do you have one of better boxes. Look carefully at the books that list ''100 things to do before you die'' or ''500 books to read in your life'' (pictures and ticked off the ones you have done)? Did you ever spend a whole evening and half of a night filling in dubious 'personality' questionnaires on the Internet? Have you ever doodled something, decided ll see that it beautifully expresses the deepest essence one of your personality and then proceeded to draw such icons for all your friends? |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846685389</amazonuk>them has a padlock...
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Luca Turin and Tania Sanchez1846276772|title=The Little Book Of PerfumesEnd of Bias: How We Change Our Minds|author=Jessica Nordell|rating=4.5|genre=LifestylePolitics and Society|summary=I have always admired people Anyone who seem is not an able, white man understands bias in that they may no longer even recognise the extent to know about scentwhich they suffer from it: it's simply a part of everyday life. White men will always come first. The able will come before the disabled. Jobs, those whose dressing tables promotions, higher salaries are littered with bottles none the preserve of which flaunt the name of a major (or increasingly, minor) celebritywhite man. Some of Even when those who wouldn't pass the bottles might be works medical become a part of art in themselves, but the general understanding is an organisation it's rare that they’ve been bought not for their vesselsviews are heard, nor for that their exclusive advertising campaigns, special offers or celeb endorsement, but for their evocative scentconcerns are acknowledged. Perfumery is clearly an art It's personally appalling and a science and if your skills aren’t as honed as they might be, this is a wonderful little book to sink your teeth into as you’re guided through degrading for the individuals on the receiving end of the field by two people very much in bias but it's not just the knowindividuals who are negatively impacted.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846685192</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Linda M JamesErling Kagge|title=How to Write and Sell Great Short StoriesWalking: One Step At A Time
|rating=5
|genre=Lifestyle|summary=Having Those who have read any my reviews before will know that how much I loved a book is evidenced by the number of books about crafting great storiespages with corners turned, I thought I had had my fill and that there were no more books left that could bolster my enthusiasm and help so let me start this one with an apology to get on with my writingthe Norfolk Library Service: sorry! I forgot it was your book not mine. In shortmy defence, I thought the only thing left will say that could motivate me wasas a reader of this type of book there is something connective about noting where prior readers were inspired (provided it is subtle – I'll allow creased corners, well, mebut not scribbles – for the latter we must buy our own copy – which I am about to do as soon as I have finished telling you why).|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846947162</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jolyon Fenwick and Marcus HusselbyRichard Brook|title=It Could Have Been YoursUnderstanding Human Nature: The enlightened personA User's guide Guide to the year's most desirable thingsLife|rating=4.5|genre=TriviaLifestyle|summary=In I am a world of diamond-encrusted skullsfirm believer that sometimes we choose books, gold-leafed iPhones and luxury yachts ten a pennysometimes books choose us. In my case, this is one of blingy shit (or should that be shitty bling?) the latter. Not so very long ago, if I had come across this book I'd have skimmed it's a relief to know people are still spending money on unique one-offs that are more worthwhile. The records for costliest photo, artworkfound some of it interesting, musical instrument and manuscript but it would not have all been broken 'hit home' in the twenty four months leading up way that it does now. I believe it came to this bookme not just because I was likely to give it a favourable review [ ''full disclosure The Bookbag's releaseu.s.p. Our collators have scoured is that people chose their own books rather than getting them randomly, so there is a predisposition towards expecting to like the press for those and otherbook, similarly noteworthy auctions, and found what other people paid for what you didneven if it doesn't know you would have wanted given the moneyalways turn out that way'' ] – but also because it is a book I needed to read, right now.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846684900</amazonuk>1800461682
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=David Savage0753558378|title=Furniture with SoulEffortless: Master Woodworkers and Their Craft|rating=5|genre=Crafts|summary=David Savage is a master furniture maker and one of the artists featured in the book, so he is not – as he says himself – a neutral observer and nor can he be neutral in choosing who to include in the book. Having said that, the pictures alone will tell you that he has chosen people who create furniture of great beauty and – often – originality. Make It's the text that makes the book shine, though – as it seeks not to give a critical appreciation of each man and one woman's work, but Easier to look at what makes them tick, what drives them on and how they have handled the good times as well as the bad. It is, if you like, ten in-depth biographies of artists who work in a common medium and ten shorter pieces about those we should look out for in the future.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>4770031211</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewDo What Matters|author=Alex Buckley|title=Ssh! Lose Weight in 20 MinutesGreg McKeown|rating=34.5
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=After years ''The marginal return of limited exercise combined with a love of fine food, Alex Buckley working harder was known to his friends as Fat Al. He followed a number of diet plans to no effect before coming up with his own solution, which is outlined in this bookfact, negative. His message is basically an extended version of the long standing sound advice that to lose weight you need to eat less and exercise more. Buckley's suggestions break this broad truth down into achievable micro steps. He provides tips on ways of sustaining weight loss by very gradually changing your behaviour. The book does not offer detailed recipes or a programme of food exclusion. It is very much about advice on small day to day choices and gradual change, written in a straightforward and easily accessible style.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908218282</amazonuk>}}'
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=1523092734
|title=A Women's Guide to Claiming Space
|author=Eliza Van Cort
|rating=5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=''She brings a hug-kick-thunderclap that every woman needs in her life. Again and again and again.'' (Alma Derricks, former CMO, Cirque du Soleil RSD)
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Diane Ackerman1529109116|title=One Hundred Names For LoveCall Me Red: A Stroke, a Marriage, and the Language of HealingShepherd's Journey|author=Hannah Jackson
|rating=4.5
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=Diane Ackerman's husband, Paul West, had been in hospital for three weeks with 'I want the image of a kidney infection and was just rejoicing in the fact British farmer to simply be that he was to go home the next day. As Diane watched , Paul suffered of a massive stroke. The effects were catastrophic, but worst of all, person who is proudly employed in feeding the man who had been a brilliant wordsmith was robbed of his power of speech and lost his extensive vocabularynation. It's eight years since this happened and the intervening years have been a constant battle to improve Paul I don's speech and restore some joy to his life. There have been ups – and many downs – but despite a brain scan indicating t think that Paul might well be a vegetable he has since his stroke written books. His vocabulary will never be back is too much to what it was, but it remains impressive and, strangely enough, many of the words which he finds easiest to use are those which he encountered a number of years agoask.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>039307241X</amazonuk>}}''
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Hugh Bowring1786495902|title=Green Living GuideThe Natural Health Service: How Nature Can Mend Your Mind|author=Isabel Hardman|rating=4.5
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=The 'Green Living Guide' is Isabel Hardman suffered a Magbook - so the format is like trauma which she chooses not to share. She says that of a magazine friend who does know, burst into tears and health- and although it initially seems a little expensive for something that looks just like a magazine you quickly findcare professionals' jaws have sagged in disbelief. Hardman dealt with this at the time by 'keeping going': the next day she went to work to cover the budget, on openingnext there was the EU referendum, that the political party leadership contests and then it contains an enormous amount of interesting was party conference season. One night she had to be sedated and useful informationreturned home to begin long-term sick leave. Even already determined eco-warriors should find something of interest in That was what brought me to this wide-ranging guidebook: 2020 was the year when the bins went out more often than I did.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907232060</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Arianne CohenLauren Martin|title=The Sex Diaries ProjectBook of Moods|rating=45
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=ItI was in a great mood when I first learnt of this book, and because sarcasm doesn's often said 'there's nowt so queer as folkt always translate well into writing, imagine the word '. Surely this should be qualified as 'theregreat's nowt so queer as folks' sex lives'being delivered with an eye roll and a sigh, through clenched teeth. Arianne Cohen has made I had spent the best part of a major online database of testimony from people about their thoughts regarding sex - having itrainy, not having itwindy weekend afternoon out on the water at our local sailing club in the rescue rib, having it with whom theyon standby in case anyone who was racing needed support. It're withs a volunteer duty we all do during the year, having it with those whom theyand normally I're not with. And in every sensem happy to, but that day the results can be exceedingly queerweather was miserable and I was miserable, and it all came to a head that evening when I noticed on the website that we had been thanked for our time as "Dave and wife". Wow. I had never needed this book more.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0091939356</amazonuk>1538733625
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Vatsyayana0008420386|title=Kama SutraFailosophy: A handbook for when things go wrong|author=Elizabeth Day
|rating=4
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=What do Malcolm Gladwell, Alain de Botton, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Lemn Sissay, Nigel Slater, Emeli Sandé, Meera Syal, Dame Kelly Holmes and Andrew Scott have in common? They've all failed and - more importantly - they've been willing to appear on Elizabeth Day's podcast to discuss their failures and how life worked out for them afterwards. You'll find the results of these discussions in ''Kama SutraFailosophy''}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1504321383|title=Single, Again, and Again, thenand Again|author=Louisa Pateman|rating=4.5|genre=Autobiography|summary=''You can't be happy and fulfilled on your own.. What could I possibly say to introduce it that You are not complete until you donfind a man''t already know or think you know?.
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jane Shilling1538731738|title=The Stranger in the MirrorSimple Abundance: A Memoir of Middle Age365 Days to a Balanced and Joyful Life|author= Sarah Ban Breathnach
|rating=5
|genre=AutobiographyLifestyle|summary=MiddleSomeone once said: it's not self-aged women disappear. indulgence, it's therapy! They are not see on televisionI think they were talking about shopping, their lives do not appear in newspapers, the legions of novels that are written each year rarely feature them. At least, that is what the author Jane Shilling believes as she wakes up aged 47 but it probably can be applied to find the narrative of her contemporaries and their lives which she has been reading about and living in parallel with since leaving university has vanished. She looks in the mirror and sees a face she does not recognisemost things. Even with a punishing regime of early bed, no alcohol and litres of waterIn my case, it refuses applies to regain its youthful bloom. So she decides writing about things because I want to take a magnifying glass , rather than because I can sell it or because I've got something to this particular moment in time, this journey between youth and old agesell.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701181001</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jacques Bonnet, James Salter and Sian ReynoldsSharon Blackie|title=Phantoms on the BookshelvesIf Women Rose Rooted|rating=3.5|genre=LifestyleBiography|summary=Translated from French this beautifully presented little I normally say that you can tell how much a book takes means to me by how many pages have corners turned down. Perhaps an even greater measure of impact is setting out to buy my own copy before I've finished reading the reader into homes boasting book collections, large and smallone I've borrowed. Studded with succinct and appropriate quotations such as I want to avoid clichés like 'powerful' 'inspiring' 'life-changing'there – although it is no better definitely the first two and only time will tell about the third – but clichés exist for a reason for and I'm not reading a book than having sure I can succinctly put it' by Anthony Burgessany better.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1906694583</amazonuk>1912836017
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sandy Donaghy1543987877|title=The Longest JourneyLearn to Love: Nine Keys Guide to Health, Wealth and HappinessHealing Your Disappointing Love Life|author=Dr Thomas Jordan
|rating=4.5
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=How many self-help books have you read where the ideas all seem very good, but they've not been tested in the fire, so 'Learn to Love: Guide to speak? Healing Your Disappointing Love Life'' is a book about love relationships rather than a book about love. The end result seems good, but you suspect that two greatest emotions are love and grief and love is the starting point wasnopposite of grief: 't 'if you love'all', Dr Thomas Jordan tells us, '' that disadvantageous and more to the point, the cynic inside you wonders if the motivation for writing the book was financial gainwill inevitably grieve''. Has it made Your love relationships begin the moment you shy away from such books? 're born and end only when you die. Now, I want you to drop the cynicism, because what Whilst we have here is a book that's written from all come into the heart world hoping to give and receive love there are many people for whom love is not quite so simple. Some people suffer multiple disappointments - sometimes repeating the wallet same mistakes - and this eventually becomes resignation. For people who are making the only motivation same mistakes repeatedly, self-preservation, in writing it was to help people. Unusual? Yup; it the form of resignation isa necessity.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1425161065</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Roy VickeryMichael Harris|title=Garlands, Conkers and Mother-DieSolitude: British and Irish Plant-LoreIn Pursuit of a Singular Life in a Crowded World
|rating=5
|genre=HistoryLifestyle|summary=This is not the book I was expecting it to be. For many centuriessome reason I expected it to be another self-help manual on how to find calm, plants have not only had practical uses as food, remedies, textiles and dyeshow to step outside the mainstream, but have also symbolic and folkloric meaning in many different culturesit is not that at all. The term Instead of telling us how, it is more about the ''plant-lorewhy''. Harries examines how we' has been coined re eroding solitude, which used to describe the profusion be a natural part of the customs our human life, and why that matters. Of course he talks about how some people have found solitude and beliefs associated with plantswhat has come of that, and this book gathers together many eventually in the final chapter he talks about his own experience of having deliberately sought it out, but mostly he wanders down the plantalleys and by-lore traditions of Britain and Irelandways that his thinking about this lost art led him.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1441101950</amazonuk>1847947662
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Cindy M Meston and David Buss0753553236|title=Why Women Have SexTiny Habits: Understanding Sexual Motivation from Adventure to Revenge (and The Small Changes That Change Everything in Between)|author=B J Fogg|rating=4.5|genre=Popular ScienceLifestyle|summary=Many many years agoGo on, a man who was far too young admit it - you're not quite perfect. You still have those odd, quirky even loveable (to be the fusty, dusty RE teacher he was shaping you) habits which seem to be, asked my best friend and I why we were each having sex with our girlfriendsannoy other people. Even aged fifteen I thought something along the lines Other people, of 'wellcourse, are sorely afflicted with some dreadful flaws which they could so easily correct, if he doesn't know by now, he never will', and listed that it was great fun, only they would make just a very enjoyable sensation, showed an appetite for the relationshiplittle bit of effort. Or put another way, I get cross with myself because I forget to do things or do some actions more than I should and that sex proved the ultimate in bonding - no matter how much closer, I try to make what seem to be blunt, could you be quite monumental changes I never quite seem to get to someone than actually inside them? grips with the concepts. I'll come clean now and admit said girlfriend was not real, but several have been since, constantly fail and then I have had heaps of fun finding out how - and perhaps why - women have sexget cross with myself for failing. I was never Lack of willpower is another burden to add to know, until now, there are 237 reasons for itthe list.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099546639</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Karen Wilkin1785785516|title=Elegant Enigmas: The Art of Edward GoreyFucking Good Manners|author=Simon Griffin
|rating=4
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=IManners maketh man, they say. It certainly makes life easier if everybody abides by a set of conventions, some of which are ages old and other which have evolved over time. Manners are not about how much to tip or how you should behave if you get an invitation to Buckingham Palace, they have nothing to do with class or financial status: they'm re about getting the basics right before we try to deal with more difficult matters. Of course we all in favour of Edward Gorey becoming a bigger namehave more relaxed manners when we're with family and friends, especially here in but it's best if we learn to distinguish between our public and private lives and to act appropriately. ''Fucking Good Manners'' aims to help us on the UKway.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1999811402|title=Painting Snails|author=Stephen John Hartley|rating=4.5|genre=Autobiography|summary=It's very difficult to classify ''Painting Snails'': originally I thought that as it's loosely based around a year on an allotment it would be a lifestyle book, but you're not going to get advice on what to plant when and where for the best results. The answer would be something along the lines of 'try it and see'. Then I considered popular science as Stephen Hartley failed his output A levels, did an engineering apprenticeship, became a busker, finally got into medical school and is certainly less lauded than in his native USAnow an A&E consultant (part-time). ItI found out that there's evident an awful lot more to what goes on in a Major Trauma Centre than you'll ever glean from the bright''Casualty'', glossy pages here but that he was an extraordinary talentisn't really what the book's about. Polymath and know-all in There's a lot about rock & roll, which seems to be the real passion of Hartley's life, in his ink drawings he can show but it didn't actually fit into the entertainment genre either. Did we have a category for 'doing the impossible the hard way'? Yep - that's the complexity of someone like Dore, while using his draughtsmanship to pen macabre whimsy, like one. It's an old-fashioned love-child of Mervyn Peake and Edward Learautobiography.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0764948040</amazonuk>
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