Title: Heavy Water_ And Other Stories Author: Martin Amis File Type: Mobi Subject:Fiction Description:Amazon.com ReviewThese nine stories span a period from 1975 to 1997 and are a good reflection of the range of Martin Amiss writing, which is always skillful and consistently seductive--sometimes irritatingly so. Amis lures his reader into an intense interest in his characters, and then, in some unsettling way, encourages us to patronize or disparage them. Its an odd strategy, but it holds our attention. By making us uncomfortable about our own less admirable attitudes, he focuses us intently on his story line. In Coincidence of the Arts, the targets are the feckless painter Sir Rodney Peel and his black doorman, aspiring novelist Pharsin Courier, who turns to him for artistic encouragement. When Peel embarks on a curious affair with a black waitress, it is sheer coincidence that she should happen to be Pharsins wife. The consequences reflect well on neither man. In State of England, we smirk knowingly at Big Mal, a bullshitting East Ender trying to sort out his life at his small sons sports day, but we are nevertheless compelled to find out what will become of him. Familiar stories about obsessive bad sex such as Let Me Count the Times have not stood the test of time, and Amiss tales of literary agents, aspiring novelists, and spoiled bestseller writers may only interest an inner coterie. Still, when he is on form, Amiss work is as deeply alluring as it is amusing. --Lisa Jardine, Amazon.co.ukFrom Publishers WeeklyAmis is an ingenious short story writer, and this collection of tales, three of which have not been seen here before, offers a good sampling of his range. This includes, of course, tone-perfect mimicry, which is evident in State of England, about a disco bouncer with a son at a posh English boys school, and What Happened to Me on My Holiday, told in the misspelled, petulant voice of a hurt child. Then there is sharp, edgy comedy based on the notion of role reversal. In Career Move, much admired when it appeared in the New Yorker six years ago, poets swagger around Hollywood in an atmosphere of big movie deals and heroin-fueled script conferences, while screenplay authors attend eager readings of each others work and vie desperately for publication in ephemeral little magazines that never pay. Straight Fiction supposes that the world is predominantly gay but that outposts of heterosexuality remain in areas like New Yorks Christopher Street and San Franciscos Castro, exerting a malificent influence on the predominant, comfortable culture. The Coincidence of the Arts has an aristocratic and evasive English artist in New York trying to avoid reading an ambitious novel thrust upon him by his black doorman. The Janitor on Mars is a satirical science fiction yarn. Amiss work is wonderfully clever and often extremely funny, but there is no escaping a certain steely-eyed coldness at the heart of it. Author tour. br 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Title: Wild Horses Author: Dick Francis File Type: Mobi Subject:Mystery Description:From Publishers WeeklyFor his 33rd-and quite splendid-novel, Francis (Decider) adds to his usual horse-racing setting a backdrop involving feature filmmaking. As usual, though, it's murder most foul and mayhem most brilliant for this English master. In the Suffolk city of Newmarket, Thomas Lyon is for the first time directing a film featuring an American megastar. Based on a bestselling book, the movie concerns a still unexplained, 26-year-old death by hanging of a young horse trainer's wife. The wife's sister, niece and nephew are vehemently opposed to the film, while the book's author, who's also the screenwriter, is opposed to any changes in his plot. The megastar's double is attacked, a murder occurs, Thomas gets death threats and finds himself in great peril. How Francis has him solve the assorted mysteries and achieve a satisfactory ending for his film is nothing short of dazzling. Francis puts his novel together in the same way a movie is constructed, with out-of-sequence scenes, dissolves and brilliant images. He offers wonderful set pieces and moves his large and colorful cast with the aplomb of a seasoned director. Even better, in Thomas Lyon he has created a representative of a vanishing, even endangered, fictional species: the thoroughly decent chap we care about. A tip-top thriller, this could make the best movie about movies since The Stunt Man. BOMC main selection; author tour. 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. From School Library JournalYA?Francis's fans will not be disappointed with his latest offering. Thomas Lyon is making a movie based on an event that occurred almost 20 years earlier?the hanging death of a horse trainer's young wife. Valentine Clark, Thomas's long-time friend and a prominent figure in the racing world, is dying, and while Thomas is reading to him he makes a death-bed confession. His whispered confidences relate too directly to Thomas's film to be ignored, especially as the movie set is plagued with suspicious problems and attempted murders. Despite being stabbed himself, Thomas tries to solve the past and present mysteries, produce his movie, and save his own life. Besides providing a many-faceted mystery and the author's trademark insights into the horse world, this novel offers an in-depth, fascinating behind-the-scenes view of filmmaking.?Katherine Fitch, Lake Braddock Secondary School, Burke, VA 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.