25 SEPTEMBER 1999, page 55

A Love Story Against All The Odds

Julian Mitchell BASIL STREET BLUES by Michael Holroyd Little, Brown, £17.50, pp. 306 O n the first page of Basil Street Blues, Michael Holroyd says he took up biogra- phy from a......

A Damned Messy Business

Giles Foden THE NATIONAL ARMY MUSEUM BOOK OF THE BOER WAR by Field Marshal Lord Carver Sidgwick, £25, pp. 280 T h e spectacle of the writing general is not always a happy one.......