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Reading & Revelry
As days grow dark and cold, we tend to retreat indoors with friends and family to eat, drink and, as Bob Cratchit would say, make merry. Cocktail parties don't throw
themselves though, nor does our Thanksgiving turkey hop into the oven and give itself a good basting. More often than not, we're in a dizzying scramble to stuff, bake, wrap and be-ribbon.
Happily, various kind people have written books to help. We've selected a few of the best books on great entertaining, and you can enter to win a collection of superb cookbooks.
On the other hand, if you're looking for some literary inspiration for your celebrations, or just can't be bothered to do it all in real life, we suggest immersing yourself in Evelyn Waugh's classic Vile
Bodies - go on, take that frenzied motor-car ride with the party set to end all party sets. Either way, these books will help you make the most of your festivities.
 Small Bites, Big Nights
Govind Armstrong
Gathering everyone you know at your place is such a nice idea - in theory - but when it comes down to it, what exactly are you going to feed them? What sophisticated yet unpredictable drinks can you serve? Govind Armstrong knows all the answers to this one, and he's put together a beautiful
book with which to share his knowledge. Find this book.
 The Essential Baker
Carole Bloom
Next to good company, good food is the cornerstone of memorable celebrations, so a dependable cookbook can become your best friend at this time of year. We'd like to give you three excellent ones,
including Carole Bloom's sumptuous volume, The Essential Baker. Find this book.
 Vile Bodies
Evelyn Waugh
"Masked parties, Savage parties, Victorian parties, Greek parties, Wild West parties, Russian parties, Circus parties, parties where one had to dress as somebody else, almost naked parties in St John's Wood, parties in flats and studios and houses and ships and hotels and night
clubs, in windmills and swimming-baths, tea parties at school where one ate muffins and meringues and tinned crab, parties at Oxford where one drank brown sherry and smoked Turkish cigarettes, dull dances in London and comic dances in Scotland and disgusting dances in Paris - all that succession
and repetition of massed humanity . . . Those vile bodies" If this excerpt doesn't entice you to read (or re-read) this classic - what possibly could? Find this
book.
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