Penguin Books Australia

Upper class scoundrel Basil Seal, mad, bad and dangerous to know, creates havoc wherever he goes, much to the despair of the three women in his life – his sister, mother and mistress. And when Neville Chamberlain declares war on Germany, it seems the perfect opportunity for more action and adventure. So Basil follows the call to arms and goes forth tot have his finest hour – as a war hero...

Men at Arms in the first book in Waugh's brilliant trilogy, Sword of Honour, which chronicles...

Part of the fabulous new hardback library of 24 Evelyn Waugh books, publishing in chronological order.

Composed between 1939-62, the late stories of Evelyn Waugh are in turn blackly comic and bitingly satirical. In 'The Sympathetic Passenger' a radio-loathing retiree picks up exactly the wrong hitchhiker, while 'Charles Ryder's Schooldays' provides a hilarious and fragmentary insight into life before...

Part of the fabulous new hardback library of 24 Evelyn Waugh books, publishing in chronological order.

Waugh's own unhappy experience of being a soldier is superbly re-enacted in this story of Guy Crouchback, a Catholic and a gentleman, commissioned into the Royal Corps of Halberdiers during the war years 1939-45. High comedy - in the company of Brigadier Ritchie-Hook or the denizens of Bellamy's Club - is only part of the shambles of Crouchback's war. When action comes in Crete and in Yugoslavia, he...

Part of the fabulous new hardback library of 24 Evelyn Waugh books, publishing in chronological order over the coming year.

In print together for the first time in many years, and here in one volume, are ALL eight of Nancy Mitford's sparklingly astute, hilarious and completely unputdownable novels, with a new introduction by India Knight.

In print together for the first time in many years, and here in one volume, are ALL eight of Nancy Mitford's sparklingly astute, hilarious and completely unputdownable novels, with a new introduction by India Knight.

'How lovely – green velvet and silver. I call that a dream, so soft and delicious, too.' She rubbed a fold of the skirt against her cheek. 'Mine's silver lamé, it smells like a bird cage when it gets hot but I do love it. Aren't you thankful evening skirts are long again?'

Ah, the dresses! But oh, the monotony of the Season, with its endless run of glittering balls. Even fabulously fashionable...

'I believe it would have been normal for me to have paid a visit to the outgoing ambassadress. However, the said ambassadress had set up such an uninhibited wail when she knew she was to leave, proclaiming her misery to all and sundry and refusing so furiously to look on the bright side, that is was felt she might not be very nice to me.'

'We've had nothing to eat since you saw us, nothing whatsoever. Course upon course of nasty greasy stuff smelling of garlic – a month's ration of meat, yes, but quite raw you know – shame, really – I wasn't going to touch it, let alone give it to Sigi, poor little mite.'
'Nanny says the cheese was matured in manure,' Sigi chipped in, eyes like saucers.

Eugenia Malmains is one of the richest girls in England and an ardent supporter of Captain Jack and the Union Jackshirts; Noel and Jasper are both in search of an heiress (so much easier than trying to work for the money); Poppy and Marjorie are nursing lovelorn hearts; and the beautiful bourgeois Mrs Lace is on the prowl for someone to lighten the boredom of her life. They all congregate near Eugenia's...

'Obsessed with sex!' said Jassy, 'there's nobody so obsessed as you, Linda. Why if I so much as look at a picture you say I'm a pygmalionist.'
In the end we got far more information out of a book called Ducks and Duck Breeding .
'Ducks can only copulate,' said Linda, after studying this for a while, 'in running water. Good luck to them.'