Country life doesn't prove quite so simple for the sophisticated city folk in Pastures Nouveaux, best-selling author Wendy Holden's hilarious "comedy of country manors". Although some of the rural inhabitants are poor as church mice, the majority are not and all pursue the same recreational activities (money and sex) as their urban cousins.

The belle of the country set is Rosie, a freelance illustrator, who (originally) is not desperately seeking a man, marriage or babies. In fact, natural beauty Rosie doesn't seem to have a problem with men at all. Although she has a partner (Mark is an arrogant journalist whose work involves dishing the dirt on the famous), he is quite obviously unsuitable for such a nice girl. It doesn't take long (page two) before Rosie thinks there must be more to life. So when Mark is given his own column about, wait for it, the travails of sophisticated city folk who move to the hilariously simple "country", she is soon romping with a very mixed set from the nouveaux-riches Samantha and Guy to a farmer fatale and a mysterious millionaire.

Thanks to her previous jobs on national newspapers and up-market glossies, Holden slickly draws her caricatures of urban types from the single-minded financiers, for whom extra-marital sex is a hobby, to their stick-insect, interior design-obsessed wives to vacuous, celebrity-sniffing media types. Champagne D'Vyne, Holden's posh-totty socialite and star of previous tales, even makes a cameo appearance (as herself, nach). If you are looking for a light read, nouvelle literature that won't stretch you too much, read on! --Carey Green

2007-08-08 Poor

I took the book on holiday but, although finding the book really unengaging, did finish it because I had nothing else to read! Some of the characters were complete stereotypes, the heroine completely wet, and the ending didn't ring true.