Titmuss Regained (Eagle Large Print) [Paperback]

John Clifford Mortimer (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1991 | ISBN-10: 0792706668 | ISBN-13: 978-0792706663

Leslie Titmuss is the anti-hero of "Paradise Postponed", portrayed on screen by David Threlfall. In this novel, John Mortimer continues the rise of the complaisant Titmuss, now married to a second unpleasant wife. The author has also written the "Rumpole" series of books.

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

British politician Leslie Titmuss finds himself at an impasse between personal interest and political beliefs when his home turf, Rapstone Valley, is proposed as the site of a huge development . This comedy of manners features several characters last seen in Paradise Postponed and represents ``Mortimer at his very best: moving, funny, literate and profound,'' according to PW .

Copyright 1991 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

Beautifully written, witty and often very, very funny Spectator --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 325 pages
• Publisher: John Curley & Assoc (October 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0792706668
• ISBN-13: 978-0792706663
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,160,577 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Tightly written, not one spare word, January 26, 2012

By 

Ancient_Fossil (CA, United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Titmuss Regained. John Mortimer (Penguin Modern Classics) (Paperback)

The surprising thing about Mr. Mortimer's book, as opposed to his Rumpole series (which are really fun reads) is his precisely perfect descriptions of emotions and the depth of his characters. They all live (and die) with grace and a certain dignity, even when naughty. This is a lively if not happy-ending book which is excellent from start to finish. Nobody is likely to be satisfied with the result, which is exactly as we live life. Sometimes I wanted to wring a few necks to get these folks to understand what was happening and make them change. Which is Mr. Mortimer's objective. He knows his stuff.

4.0 out of 5 stars The second time around, July 8, 2011

By 

Jay Dickson (Portland, OR) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Titmuss Regained. John Mortimer (Penguin Modern Classics) (Paperback)

In his second go at the inhabitants of his own "dear country," the fictional Rapstone Valley, John Mortimer shows his despicable antihero Leslie Titmuss having his own second go at courtship and marriage. The lovely widow Jenny Sidonia seems everything Titmuss missed in his first marriage to the neurotic Charlotte Fanner: physically lovely and sweet tempered, Jenny (formerly the wife of a liberal Oxbridge don) is also willing to overlook Leslie's politics and settle down with him in the former Fanner estate Rapstone Manor. But the planned invasion of a new township threatens to unsettle their happiness in the Rapstone Valley... and as a Tory cabinet minister, Leslie cannot risk blocking the new plans for his own domestic comfort...

Mortimer's 1990 sequel to PARADISE POSTPONED doesn't hit the manic comic highs of its predecessor, but its still a beautifully constructed novel that gives us again a good sense of everything Mortimer thinks is wrong with England, from the loathsome machinations of a Tory-controlled press to the self-serving and cruel rhetoric employed by Leslie himself, to the ineffectual protests and perceived kookiness of Leslie's enemies on the left. (The true hero of PARADISE POSTPONED, Dr. Fred Simcox, is back here, both as a potential rival for Jenny's affections and as an opponent to the Rapstone Valley development scheme.) If there is something a bit predictable about Mortimer's constant nostalgia for his own vanishing England (and weren't the Simcox brewery or the neighboring town's biscuit factory likely seen as blights on the landscape when they were built, despite Mortimer's mourning for them?), he does achieve something pretty near to first rate in his portrait of Titmuss's marriage to Jenny. In this Mortimer approximates something of what George Meredith did in THE EGOIST, in its unforgettable portrait of an intelligent and lovely young woman horrified to realize she's mistakenly tied herself to a monster.