Tower and Town, August 2026 (view the full edition)A Good ReadI’ve been reading rather randomly lately, so forgive me if this column seems a bit haphazard and disconnected. Blame the heat and the World Cup, at least one of which will be over by the time this goes to print. I’m really not remotely interested in football except, like a lot of people, every four years when I become unreasonably invested in the progress of some random African or South American country which I probably couldn’t find on the map. And it’s a hot summer. So light and diverting books are what I want, and that’s what I’m sharing with you. You already know about my borderline deranged enthusiasm for the various works of Lissa Evans. Her latest book My Name is Mackenzie Bly is, like the diaries of Adrian Mole, or Nigel Molesworth, hard to categorise. Is it for adults or children (young teens)? Well, really anyone who will appreciate poor Mackenzie (real name Philip)'s trials; he's tall and clumsy, amiable, surprisingly good in a crisis, and with agonisingly embarrassing parents and tiresome schoolmates. "It's unbelievable what I have to put up with" he says, glumly. Like all the best comedy it's also insightful and poignant at times, but mostly just very funny. I chortled throughout. Rules of the Heart is top quality historical fiction by Janice Hadlow, author of The Other Bennett Sister (which, like the football, see above, I thought it wasn’t my thing, and actually loved). It’s the story of Harriet, Lady Bessborough - sister of Georgiana, Duchesss of Devonshire (and now I have to go back and re-read Amanda Foreman’s biography of her. There's no let up to this reading lark, I tell you.), mother of Lady Caroline Lamb, friend of Lady Hester Stanhope and a leading figure in Whig society. The novel is Harriet's telling of the story of her notorious love affair with Lord Granville, and the conflict when real emotion exists within a brittle, restrictive and callous social milieu. And still in the C18th - Happy 250th Birthday, America. Like everyone in early middle age, you're not as fresh and optimistic as once you were, and you'd have to admit that like everyone you had your stroppy, spotty, tiresome moments in your youth. The American Revolution was prolonged and complex and much mythologised. One day I'll read serious scholarly works about the Patriotic War/Colonial Rebellion. Till then I'm enjoying The British Are Coming, a graphic version of Rick Atkinson's 'proper' book of the same name. History in pictures, just what I need. Debby Guest |