Product Description

Frances Angel, drunk and disgruntled, arrives in Italy to attend the I Zingari Art School, leaving behind her dazzling career as a successful theatrical impresario and returning to a distant and painful past. She falls into an eclectic group of performance artists, ex soldiers and a housewife who really just wants to paint something to match her settee. In the village a scale replica of the La Scala opera house becomes the setting for the great drama of Francis' past to be played out on the world's smallest stage. Francis expected to find some answers but what she didn't expect was romance and quite so much farce.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #48125 in Books
• Published on: 2006-07-03
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Review
'Just the thing for the airport delay' DAILY IRELAND 'Here's one that slips down easily and aids restful sleep - a delightful new novel . . . A page-turner with great one-liners' THE TIMES 'Bounces along with the good-natured levity one would expect from this author . . . warmly recommended as a light summer read - to be digested over a grappa in a sunlit Italian piazza' SUNDAY TELEGRAPH 'A book that bounces along with great verve and energy subverting all the cliches... The result is a real page turner... It's also very funny- Toksvig has a terrific sense of timing.' TIME OUT 'A most enjoyable read.' THE LADY

DAILY IRELAND
'Just the thing for the airport delay'

Time Out, August 8, 2006
‘a real page-turner . . . It’s also very funny – Toksvig has a terrific sense of timing’

Customer Reviews

not "rip-roaringly funny"
This is a good read, but certainly not in the same league as the others I've read. It's far more ordinary. I really disagree with the comments on the back cover; I failed to see that much humour in it, though there were some teriffic one-liners. Some likeable characters, though rather too many perhaps - I got rather muddled! Essentially a good plot and a satifactory conclusion.

A PERFECT SUMMER READ
Unlike some of the other reviewers, I loved this book and could easily imagine spending my time most enjoyably in the summer school in Umbria and loved the idea of the little theatre and the machinations needed to save it. Perhaps not quite up to the incredibly high standard Sandi has previously set, this book is still full of delightful characters, intrigue and comic dialogue which is first rate. It is well worth the price of admission.

Mick Drake author of the comic novel All`s Well at Wellwithoute

Not As Good As Expected!
A comedy of errors set in Umbria, so of added interest for me. I learnt some new Italian proverbs from the chapter headings but have yet to discover the relevance of the book's title.
There are dark undertones within this story as Frances/Francesca Angel/Angelli at forty returns to Montecastello, the town she knew as home for the first five years of her life. Here she confronts the demons of her past while attending the local art school, along with an amusing and motley cast of characters.
Overall although an ok read it was not as good as I had expected from Sandi Toksvig and in some ways did not feel complete.