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What you should be reading instead of 50 Shades of Grey

7th September 2012 by Helena 2 Comments  

A couple of weeks ago I ranted on about what not to read, namely 50 Shades of Drivel. Meaningless, humourless, trite, sentimental and badly written. I have just finished a book that is the exact opposite and I urge you all to read it.

I am not the only person to love the author of this novel; he has been compared by critics to Wilde, Wodehouse and Waugh. But for some reason he is not well known and his books have yet to be turned into films or become huge best-sellers. He is an English writer called Edward St Aubyn and is probably best known for his Booker nominated novel Mother’s Milk. I have just finished the first book in what has become known as the ‘Patrick Melrose novels’, called Never Mind.

Rupert got me on to him. I have never seen him devour a series of books so quickly, or read so many choice bits out to me.”He’s as brilliant as Martin Amis wishes he was,” he told me.

Never Mind is not an easy read; it is terribly cruel and quite disturbing. But it is hysterically funny at the same time. The characters are not really the sort of people you would want to meet, but they are compelling, brilliantly believable and terribly amusing. I suppose the book is a little like a Cold Comfort Farm on steroids; sharper, wittier, more cruel and ultimately more memorable.

Here is one of my favourite quotes from the book, one of the main characters talking about her French neighbours: “Eleanor was intrigued by these people. She imagined their austere and fruitful life like a stained-glass window in a medieval church – labourers in the vineyard with grape-filled baskets on their backs. She had seen one of the Fauberts in the Credit Agricole and he had the sullen air of a man who looks forward to strangling poultry.”

I am about to start on the second novel and can’t wait. And once I have finished them all, I am going to go back and read Never Mind again, in the hope that some of St Aubyn’s wit and brilliance rubs off on me.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2012


Filed Under: Books, Lifestyle, blog --> Tagged With: instead, reading, shades, should

2 thoughts on What you should be reading instead of 50 Shades of Grey

  • Garry Craig Powell says:
    7th September 2012 at 11:02 am

    I love Edward St. Aubyn. Never mind is horrific, but always compelling. A master stylist.

  • Garry Craig Powell says:
    7th September 2012 at 11:03 am

    I love Edward St. Aubyn too. This is a harrowing read, but a very compelling one. He’s a master stylist.

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Helena Frith Powell was born in Sweden to a Swedish mother and Italian father, but grew up mainly in England. She is the author of eleven books, translated into several languages including Chinese and Russian. She wrote the French Mistress column The Sunday Times about life in France for several years. She is a regular contributor to the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, The Times, Daily Telegraph, Tatler Magazine and Harper’s Bazaar.

Helena has been the editor of four magazines, including M Magazine, a supplement for the Abu Dhabi-based National Newspaper and FIVE, a high-end fashion glossy, also published in Abu Dhabi. Helena was also editor-in-chief of 360 Life, a quarterly glossy magazine published with the Sports 360 Newspaper in Dubai, part of the Chalhoub Group.

Helena contributes regularly to UK-based newspapers and magazines and holds a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Cambridge. She is working on a thriller set in Sweden as well as a novel about the relationship between Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield called Sense of an Echo.

In 2022 her short story The Japanese Gardener came second in the Fish Publishing Short Story Prize. One of her stories was also shortlisted for the Bridport Short Story Prize. When she’s not writing, she works as a headhunter for the media and entertainment industry for the Sucherman Group. 

Helena, who was educated at Durham University, lives in the Languedoc region of France with her husband Rupert and their three children.

Bibliography

More France Please, we’re British; Gibson Square 2004

Two Lipsticks and a Lover 2005; Gibson Square (hardback)

All You Need to be Impossibly French; (US version of above) Penguin 2006

Two Lipsticks and a Lover; Arrow Books (paperback) 2007

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (hardback) 2006

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (paperback) 2007

So Chic! (French version of Two Lipsticks) Leduc Editions 2008 (also translated into Chinese, Russian and Thai)

More, More France; Gibson Square 2009

To Hell in High Heels; Arrow Books 2009 (also translated into Polish)

The Viva Mayr Diet; Harper Collins 2009

Love in a Warm Climate; Gibson Square 2011

The Ex-Factor; Gibson Square 2013

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles; Gibson Square 2016

The Arnolfini Marriage; Amazon Kindle December 2016

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles (paperback); Gibson Square spring 2018

The Longest Night; Gibson Square spring 2019

 

 

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