Behind the Mask: The Life of Vita Sackville-West by Matthew Dennison (Collins, £25). Brave man to take on the biography of Vita, and he has brought it off superbly. So many facets, so many talents, so rich and full a life. Where do you start? Aristocrat, writer, greatly underrated novelist, garden creator, poet, wife, mother, friend, lover — it’s all here; and this is no dull ‘birth to death’ chronicle. It studies and reveals this extraordinary woman as well as could possibly be. A fine achievement.
The Mad Boy, Lord Berners, My Mother and Me by Sofka Zinovieff (Cape, £25). If you love Lord Merlin you love Lord Berners, and if you don’t follow me you shouldn’t be reading this. I was once at a book signing in Burford with the late Debo Devonshire when a remarkable elderly lady came up.
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