Thank you for all your lovely birthday greetings! I will do the prize draw soon, and today bought the book I’m intending to send… it’s very good, by one of my favourite authors, and not all that easy to find.
Now onto another Shiny New Books review for my Century of Books – Miss Lonelyhearts by Nathanael West. I volunteered to read the very beautiful new edition from Daunt Books, and was surprised by the date and description. And after a bit of digging realised that, yet again, two authors with vaguely similar minds had become amalgamated in my mind – this was another case of the Penelopes (or V.S. Naipaul and V.S. Pritchett, etc. etc.) – Nathanael West was, of course, not the same as Nathaniel Hawthorne… embarrassing.
Anyway, enough preamble, do go over to Shiny New Books and read my thoughts on Miss Lonelyhearts (1933) – and don’t forget to check out Oliver’s Five Fascinating Facts about Nathanael West while you’re there.