Recent paperbacks

James Hughes-Onslow

Memories Frances Partridge (Robin Clark £2.95). A first-hand account of Bloomsbury by a member of the Group. Frances Marshall married Ralph Partridge, breaking up the trio and precipitating the Strachey-Carrington crisis. A day to day chronicle of stewed plums and milk pudding with Woolfs, Bells, Frys, Grants, Macarthys and Sitwells.

The Fate of Mary Rose Caroline Blackwood (Penguin £1.50). 'She is a child crushed between two separated parents of equal unpleasantness, the mother an out-and-out hysteric, the father an egocentric of monumental dimensions' says Books and Bookmen. A clever horror story about macabre events in a village in Kent.

Bawdy verse and Folksongs Robert Burns, in- troduced by Magnus Magnusson (Papermac £3.50). Mr Mastermind's special subject is 18th- century lust in Ayrshire. Robbie himself thought these songs to end all Burns nights were too crude for publication. Burns societies will pro- bably agree. 'Hurdies fyke' means 'buttocks in action' says the glossary.

Macbeth William Shakespeare (Oval £3.50) 'The unabridged first folio text in stunning full colour cartoon'. These lurid pictures should liven up '0' levels and, by dispensing with stage directions, footnotes and cribs, make play-reading more entertaining for all ages.

The Countryside Cookbook: Recipes and remedies Gail Duff (Sphere £5.95). For whoop- ing cough try an infusion of chestnut leaves. For hysteria, camomile. This beautifully illustrated (by Linda Garland) book tells you where to find wild plants and what to do with them.

Food as Presents Patricia H. White (Penguin £1.95). Too many apples, plums and green tomatoes? Give them away for Christmas, disguised as jelly, jam or chutney. If you prefer giving books, try Edible Gifts, an illustrated hardback (Bodley Head £4.95) by Claire Clifton and Martina Nicolls.

Love Rules Barbara Cartland (New English Library £1.25). Her 307th wildly romantic novel, a figure now superseded because she has averag- ed 23 for the last five years. This one is about a Russian Prince who elopes with a commoner, starts the Battenburg family and lives passionate- ly ever after. A Breed of Heroes Alan Judd (Fontana £1.95). A first novel about a much-neglected subject, Northern Ireland, by a soldier who has served in Belfast, Derry and South Armagh. Judd tackles the horror and tedium of Ulster with humour and sympathy, skilfully blending bitterness with farce.

The Kingdom Robert Lacey (Fontana £2.95). 'If it were not for a freak of geology, few people in the western world would give a fig about King Khalid and his falcons' writes Lacey in his foreword. As it is, he has just spent four years there with his family, sampling high and low life and telling us what we all need to know. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass Lewis Carroll (OUP £1.75). A revised version, but still containing Tenniel's il- lustrations, in which Roger Lancelyn Green has made some amendments, notably to the Chess Game in which the moves were previouslY wrong. Of course.

Righteous Gentile John Bierman (Penguin £1.75). The story of a courageous young Swede who used blackmail and bribery to save perhaps 100,000 Jews from the Nazis in Budapest. He Is probably still alive in a Soviet concentration camp, yet Israel has not tried to get him out. The Penguin Guide to Prehistoric England and Wales James Dyer (Penguin £3.95). The author suggests that prehistoric monuments offer ex' cellent opportunities to discover remote parts of the countryside. So it's a pity he has left out Scotland.

The Self-made Men Michael Curtin (Penguin £1.75). Curtin has been compared to Flann O'Brien and his main character Whelan is described as the craziest and most endearing Irish hero since Donleavy's Ginger Man. Very livelY dialogue. Gilbert White's Year Edited by John Cony mander (OUP £2.95). The curate of Selborne wrote a Garden Kalendar and The Naturalist s Journal between 1751 and 1793. Here are some of his expert and detailed observations compress- ed into a single year.

The Terrible Secret Walter Laqueur (Penguin £1.95). Subtitled 'Suppression of the truth about Hitler's Final Solution'. New evidence suggests that many people inside and outside GermanY, including the Pope, knew at the time about the destruction of the Jews. But there was nothing they could do to stop it.

Black Sportsmen Ernest Cashmore (Routledge 84 . Kegan Paul £5.95). By 1990 half the English football team may be black, not because blacks are physically superior to whites but because academic prowess is discouraged. Athletic ex- cellence is the easiest way to get on.

The Crisp Report Christopher Matthew (Arrow

A £1.25). A sequel to Diary of a Somebody and Loosely Engaged. This time Simon Crisp leaves the world of elegant house-parties and under- takes serious research into wife-swaPPIng' adultery, sleazy massage parlours and sex films. London After The Bomb: What a nuclear. sock really means Owen Greene and others (OUP £1.95). Home Office civil defence plans are! delusion because most victims would die slowly in the weeks and months after a nuclear attack• reads it.i very unpleasant but I hope that someone

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