THE DUD AVOCADO gained instant cult status on first publication and remains a timeless portrait of a woman hellbent on living. It is, as the GUARDIAN observes, 'one of the best novels about growing up fast'. Sally Jay Gorce is a woman with a mission. It's the 1950s, she's young, and she's in Paris. Having dyed her hair pink, she wears evening dresses in the daytime and vows to go native in a way not even the natives can manage. Embarking on an educational programme that includes an affair with a married man (which fizzles out when she realises he's single and wants to marry her); nights in cabarets and jazz clubs in the company of assorted "citizens of the world"; an entanglement with a charming psychopath; and a bit part in a film financed by a famous matador. But an education like this doesn't come cheap. Will our heroine be forced back to the States to fulfill her destiny as a librarian, or can she keep up her whirlwind Parisian existence?

THE DUD AVOCADO gained instant cult status on first publication and remains a timeless portrait of a woman hellbent on living. It is, as the GUARDIAN observes, 'one of the best novels about growing up fast'. Sally Jay Gorce is a woman with a mission. It's the 1950s, she's young, and she's in Paris. Having dyed her hair pink, she wears evening dresses in the daytime and vows to go native in a way not even the natives can manage. Embarking on an educational programme that includes an affair with a married man (which fizzles out when she realises he's single and wants to marry her); nights in cabarets and jazz clubs in the company of assorted "citizens of the world"; an entanglement with a charming psychopath; and a bit part in a film financed by a famous matador. But an education like this doesn't come cheap. Will our heroine be forced back to the States to fulfill her destiny as a librarian, or can she keep up her whirlwind Parisian existence?

'One of the funniest books I've ever read' - Gore Vidal * The Dud Avocado gained instant cult status on first publication and remains a timeless portrait of a woman hellbent on living. It is, as the Guardian observes, 'one of the best novels about growing up fast'. Sally Jay Gorce is a woman with a mission. It's the 1950s, she's young, and she's in Paris. Having dyed her hair pink, she wears evening dresses in the daytime and vows to go native in a way not even the natives can manage. Embarking on an educational programme that includes an affair with a married man (which fizzles out when she realises he's single and wants to marry her); nights in cabarets and jazz clubs in the company of assorted "citizens of the world"; an entanglement with a charming psychopath; and a bit part in a film financed by a famous matador. But an education like this doesn't come cheap. Will our heroine be forced back to the States to fulfill her destiny as a librarian, or can she keep up her whirlwind Parisian existence? * A champagne cocktail ... Rich, invigorating, and deceptively simple to the taste ... One falls for Sally Jay Gorce from a great height from the first sentence - Observer As delightful and delicate an examination of how it is to be twenty and in love and in Paris as I've ever read - Sunday Times I had to tell someone how much I enjoyed The Dud Avocado. It made me laugh, scream, and guffaw (which, incidentally, is a great name for a law firm). - Groucho Marx Books included in the VMC 40th anniversary series include: Frost in May by Antonia White; The Collected Stories of Grace Paley; Fire from Heaven by Mary Renault; The Magic Toyshop by Angela Carter; The Weather in the Streets by Rosamond Lehmann; Deep Water by Patricia Highsmith; The Return of the Soldier by Rebecca West; Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston; Heartburn by Nora Ephron; Memento Mori by Muriel Spark; A View of the Harbour by Elizabeth Taylor; and Faces in the Water by Janet Frame

'The iron of the bridge felt hot under my hand. The sun had been upon it all day. Gripping hard with my hands I lifted myself on to the bar and gazed down steadily on the water passing under ... I thought of places I would never see, and women I should never love. A white sea breaking on a beach, the slow rustle of a shivering tree, the hot scent of grass ... I breathed deeply and I felt as though the waiting water rose up in front of me and would not let me go' As far as his father, an accomplished poet, is concerned, Richard will never amount to anything, and so he decides to take his fate into his own hands. But at the last moment, he is saved by Jake, who appeals to Richard not to waste his life. Together they set out for adventure, jumping aboard the the first ship they see and working their passage to Norway and around Europe, eventually to bohemian Paris, where Richard meets Hesta, a captivating music student ...

In "The Dud Avocado," Elaine Dundy revealed the life of a young expatriate in Paris in all its hilarious and heartbreaking drama. With "The Old Man and Me," she tackles the American girl in London, a bit older, but certainly no wiser. Honey Flood (if that's her real name) is determined to make the Soho scene, and she'll know she's arrived when she snags its greatest prize, the literary star C. D. McKee.
Set in an early sixties London that is just beginning to swing, "The Old Man and Me "is populated by hipsters, pill-poppers, literary upstarts, would-be bohemians, and titled divorcees matching wits in smoky nightclubs and Mayfair flats. But by the time Honey gets what she thinks she's after, she may find that the world she was hell-bent on conquering has gotten the better of her. Elaine Dundy knows her characters inside and out and renders them with perfect pitch to create a story as funny as it is poignant.

"The Dud Avocado "follows the romantic and comedic adventures of a young American who heads overseas to conquer Paris in the late 1950s. Edith Wharton and Henry James wrote about the American girl abroad, but it was Elaine Dundy’s Sally Jay Gorce who told us what she was really thinking. Charming, sexy, and hilarious, "The Dud Avocado" gained instant cult status when it was first published and it remains a timeless portrait of a woman hell-bent on living.
“I had to tell someone how much I enjoyed "The Dud Avocado." It made me laugh, scream, and guffaw (which, incidentally, is a great name for a law firm).” –Groucho Marx
"["The Dud Avocado"] is one of the best novels about growing up fast..." "-The Guardian"

Who on the planet doesn't know that Elvis Presley gave electrifying performances and enthralled millions? Who doesn't know that he was the King of Rock 'n' Roll? But who knows that the King himself lived in the thrall of one dominant person?

This was Gladys Smith Presley, his protective, indulgent, beloved mother.

"Elvis and Gladys," one of the best researched and most acclaimed books on Elvis's early life, reconstructs the extraordinary role Gladys played in her son's formative years.

Uncovering facts not seen by other biographers, "Elvis and Gladys" reconstructs for the first time the history of the mother and son's devoted relationship and reveals new information about Elvis--his Cherokee ancestry, his boyhood obsession with comic books, and his early compulsion to rescue his family from poverty.

Coming to life in the compelling narrative is the poignant story of a unique boy and the maternal tie that bound him. It is at once an intimate psychological portrait of a tragic relationship and a mesmerizing tale of the early years of an international idol.

"For once, a legend is presented to us by the mind and heart of a literate, careful biographer who cares," wrote Liz Smith in the "New York Daily News" when "Elvis and Gladys" was originally published in 1985. This is the book, Smith says, "for any Elvis lover who wants to know more about what made Presley the man he was and the mama's boy he became."

The "Boston Globe" called this thoughtful, informative biography of one of popular music's most enduring stars "nothing less than the best Elvis book yet."

Betsy Lou Saegessor is bent on revenge. Having been the cossetted darling of her very rich father until his remarriage to a woman she considers well beneath her, Betsy is devastated when said father dies - not least because he's left all his money to the drippy second wife, Pauly. Pauly goes on to marry the legendary and elusive Englishman, C.D. McKee, who in turn, when Pauly dies, inherits the money that Betsy Lou would like back in her own bank account. So Betsy sets out to seduce and betray C.D., who is fat and ugly but very entertaining and incredibly sexy. She follows him through the night clubs of London, listening to jazz and smoking hash; shops with him at antique fairs; and accompanies him to her first Country House Weekend, where the lampooning of Americans proceeds in earnest. A wickedly funny novel falling in love -- with an Old Man and the Old World -- despite the best intentions.