Fillets of Plaice

Fillets of Plaice by Gerald Durrell

This book is split up so it is like many books in one. The first section was set in Greece where Durrell took his mother on a boating holiday which had disastrous effects. The second section was set in London where he gets a job and finds two new friends. One unfortunately dies at the end of the section. The third section is set in a jungle where he has to help a friend socialise with his boss to get a promotion. The fourth section is also set in England and he obtains and injury and is forced into a nursing home for three weeks with occasional trips to the hospital. The fifth and final section is about him getting a weird girlfriend who gets married to another man in the end. I like Gerald's books although it took me quite a while to get in to them. This is another book that i read on holiday. I am giving it 7/10.

MB

I was given this book by my mother when I was Matthew's age and I enjoyed it greatly. I suggested to Matthew that he might enjoy it and I am glad that he has. This is typical Gerald Durrell and is gentle and most amusing. He has the ability to pick out and observe behaviour in others in a clever way. He is no literary giant ( His brother Lawrence was the novelist of the family however I am sure Gerald sold more books) His books are wistful and reminiscent of another time when the Empire was setting and the colonial days . It is as described by Matt a collection of short stories relating to earlier times in Gerald's life. I did enjoy the descriptions and you get a feel for the environment that he is in. I do recomend his other works especially 'Rosie is my relative'. I give this an 8 out of 10.

JB


Overall 7.5 /10