Synopses & Reviews
Sarah Lyall, a reporter for the New York Times, moved to London in the mid-1990s and soon became known for her amusing and incisive dispatches on her adopted country. As she came to terms with its eccentric inhabitants (the English husband who never turned on the lights, the legislators who behaved like drunken frat boys, the hedgehog lovers, the people who extracted their own teeth), she found that she had a ringside seat at a singular transitional era in British life. The roller-coaster decade of Tony Blair's New Labor government was an increasingly materialistic time when old-world symbols of aristocratic privilege and stiff-upper-lip sensibility collided with modern consumerism, overwrought emotion, and a new (but still unsuccessful) effort to make the trains run on time. Appearing a half-century after Nancy Mitford's classic Noblesse Oblige, Lyall's book is a brilliantly witty account of twenty-first-century Britain that will be recognized as a contemporary classic.
Review
"Lyall is at her tart, observant best." Matt Weiland
Review
"A witty, incisive collection of essays . . . on everything English." Elle
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"A razor-sharp . . . wickedly insightful, decidedly biased account of everything British." Graydon Carter
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Fresh, funny and occasionally wicked. --Editors' Choice
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"Fresh, funny and occasionally wicked." New York Times Book Review - Editors' Choice
Synopsis
Sarah Lyall moved to London in the mid-1990s and soon became known for amusing and sharp dispatches on her adopted country. Confronted by the eccentricities of these island people (the English husband who never turned on the lights, the legislators who behaved like drunken frat boys, the hedgehog lovers), she set about trying to figure out the British. Part anthropological field study and part memoir, has already received great acclaim and recognition for the astuteness, humor, and sensitivity with which the author wields her pen.
Synopsis
'Should be handed out . . . in the immigration line at Heathrow.' '"Malcolm GladwellSarah Lyall moved to London in the mid-1990s and soon became known for amusing and sharp dispatches on her adopted country. Confronted by the eccentricities of these island people (the English husband who never turned on the lights, the legislators who behaved like drunken frat boys, the hedgehog lovers), she set about trying to figure out the British. Part anthropological field study and part memoir,
The Anglo Fileshas already received great acclaim and recognition for the astuteness, humor, and sensitivity with which the author wields her pen.
Synopsis
"Should be handed out . . . in the immigration line at Heathrow." --Malcolm Gladwell
Synopsis
Dispatches from the new Britain: a slyly funny and compulsively readable portrait of a nation finally refurbished for the twenty-first century.
About the Author
Sarah Lyallgrew up in New York City and writes for the New York Timesin London. She lives there with her husband, the writer Robert McCrum, and their two daughters.