Never eat at restaurants where they picture the food on the menu. Steer clear of books which explain the characters in a glossary. If you have to give your customers an idea in advance of what to expect, then it follows that your cooking/narrative may not be up to scratch.
Never eat at restaurants where they picture the food on the menu. Steer clear of books which explain the characters in a glossary. If you have to give your customers an idea in advance of what to expect, then it follows that your cooking/narrative may not be up to scratch.
However, when it comes to Jilly Cooper’s latest novel, Jump! (Bantam, £18.99), I will excuse anything. I don’t care about the 80-strong cast-list, including a tree surgeon called Woody and a Lothario named Shagger Simmons. I don’t care about the long list of animals, most of which perish. I wouldn’t even have minded if Jilly had thrown in a Pakistani Muslim called Rafiq who is radicalised at an FE college in the Midlands and, after a failed bomb plot, is sent to an open prison where he takes part in a scheme pairing inmates with retired racehorses and so nurses back to health an injured gelding before leaping on its back and over the prison wall. Oh no, wait, she did actually put that in.
Well, I don’t care, because this book is about my dreams. It is a magnificent portrayal of how a beautiful young girl might become the first woman ever to win the Grand National. We overgrown pony-lovers can’t live on National Velvet forever, you know. I’m on the finishing straight at Aintree every time I gallop Tara Lee up the ‘A3 dash’ in Wisley Woods.
Let’s face it, they should advertise Jilly’s novels like the cheezy-peaz sketch on The Fast Show, substituting the words sex and horses: ‘Do you like sex? Do you like horses? Then you’ll love sexy horse books!’ And we do.
Comments
Join the debate for just £1 a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for £3.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just £1 a monthAlready a subscriber? Log in