Add a Dash of Pity

Eight short stories that are, like Ustinov himself was, urbane and witty. Each one satirizes an area of contempory life (as it was in 1958 when these were published) in the Western world. An Hungarian violinist, two Russian authors struggling with communism, a Spanish bullfight that gets completely out of hand, and that had me laughing out loud many times, an English colonel growing plants in the title (and best) story, an English scientist who can put a man on the moon, a tragic Czech couple, an English man who is the voice of a rabbit on a BBC children's program, and four World War II generals in a frozen Russian shack. All are immensely entertaining, unpredictable, very original, and touchingly human. Highly recommended.

I did not expect much from Ustinov as an author, because it was from his acting career that I first heard of him. With this colletion of short stories, however, I was pleasantly surprised. Every story is easy to get into, well thought out in terms of plot, and written beautifully. Need an example? This extract comes from the first story, "The Man Who Took it Easy": 'He caroused all night, talking black philosophy to his cronies while his mistress smoked knowingly...' Ustinov is very good at forming a picture of a scene or situation within the reader's mind. The subjects of his stories range from that of a down-and-out composer (The Man Who Took it Easy) to that of a WWII Italian soldier sitting in a shack in the middle of nowhere, waiting to die (The Aftertaste). Read these stories. Trust me, you will enjoy them.